PRIVACY + SECURITY BLOG

News, Developments, and Insights

Privacy Need Not Be Sacrificed for Security

I’ve long been saying that privacy need not be sacrificed for security, and it makes me delighted to see that public attitudes are aligning with this view.  A Pew survey revealed that a “majority of Americans (54%) disapprove of the U.S. government’s collection of telephone and internet data as part of anti-terrorism efforts.”  The anti-NSA […]

Blogging Highlights 2015: Health Privacy+Security Issues

I’ve been going through my blog posts from 2015 to find the ones I most want to highlight.  Here are some selected posts about health privacy and security: Why HIPAA Matters: Medical ID Theft and the Human Cost of Health Privacy and Security Incidents

Blogging Highlights 2015: Cybersecurity Issues

I’ve been going through my blog posts from 2015 to find the ones I most want to highlight.  Here are some selected posts about security: The Worst Password Ever Created Should the FTC Kill the Password? The Case for Better Authentication

Blogging Highlights 2015: Privacy Issues

I’ve been going through my blog posts from 2015 to find the ones I most want to highlight.  Here are some selected posts on privacy issues: I. PHILOSOPHICAL Privacy by Design: 4 Key Points What Is Privacy? II. PRIVACY LAW Why All Law Schools Should Teach Privacy Law — and Why Many Don’t

Ransomware’s Dilemma: Pay It or Not?

Ransomware is one of the most frightening scourges to hit the Internet.  Ransomware is a form of malware (malicious code) that encrypts a person’s files and demands a ransom payment to decrypt them.  If the money isn’t paid, the encryption keys are destroyed, and the data is lost forever. Ransomware began to emerge in 2009, […]

10 Implications of the New EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)

Last week, the EU issued the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), a long-awaited comprehensive privacy regulation that will govern all 28 EU member countries.  Clocking in at more than 200 pages, this is quite a document to digest.  According to the European Commission press release: “The regulation will establish one single set of rules which […]

The Kafkaesque Sacrifice of Encryption Security in the Name of Security

By Daniel J. Solove Proponents for allowing government officials to have backdoors to encrypted communications need to read Franz Kafka.  Nearly a century ago, Kafka deftly captured the irony at the heart of their argument in his short story, “The Burrow.” After the Paris attacks, national security proponents in the US and abroad have been […]

Does Cybersecurity Law Work Well? An Interview with Ed McNicholas

“The US is developing a law of cybersecurity that is incoherent and unduly complex,” says Ed McNicholas, one of the foremost experts on cybersecurity law.  McNicholas is a partner at Sidley Austin LLP and co-editor of the newly-published treatise, Cybersecurity: A Practical Guide to the Law of Cyber Risk (with co-editor Vivek K. Mohan).   The […]

K-12 Schools Must Teach Data Privacy and Security

By Daniel J. Solove It is essential that children learn about data privacy and security.  Their lives will be fully enveloped by technologies that involve data.  But far too little about these topics is currently taught in most schools.  Fortunately, there is a solution, one that I’m proud to have been involved in creating.  The […]