The media has been reporting on the tragic suicide of Tyler Clementi, a student at Rutgers University. From CNN:
Are People Really Harmed By a Data Breach?
“It’s just a flesh wound.”
— Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Over at Privacy & Security Source, Andrew Serwin, a leading privacy lawyer and author of an excellent treatise on privacy law, has a very thoughtful and informative post [link no longer available] about cases where courts found no harm to individuals by data security breaches. Serwin observes:
Fourth Amendment Pragmatism Article Now Available
I just posted my new forthcoming essay on SSRN called Fourth Amendment Pragmatism, 51 Boston College Law Review __ (forthcoming 2010). Here’s the abstract:
Cell Phone Stalking
According to the Wall St. Journal, “more than 25,000 adults in the U.S. are victims of GPS stalking annually, including by cellphone.” The article notes that a cell phone account holder can track everyone on the account. Users are notified by text message but can’t stop it.
This tracking policy might work well with a pesky teenager, but what about cases of domestic violence?
An Interview with Ronald Collins on Justice Holmes and Free Speech
In his new book, The Fundamental Holmes: A Free Speech Chronicle and Reader (Cambridge University Press, 2010), Ronald Collins guides us through the free speech writings of Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. Ron is the Harold S. Shefelman scholar at the University of Washington School of Law and a fellow at the Washington, D.C., office of the First Amendment Center.
Ron’s book contains numerous excerpts from Holmes’s great judicial opinions, correspondence, essays, and books. Far from composing the book mainly of excerpts, Ron has provided very extensive commentary and background throughout. Ron is steeped in the history of his subject and has a rich understanding of the law and theory of the First Amendment. There is no better guide to help us understand Holmes’s work and thought as it relates to free speech.
I recently had a chance to talk with Ron about the book.
Naked Lies and the Airport Body Scan
Despite many objections, the TSA has been moving forward on using new airport body scan machines that show people’s naked bodies. I blogged about these machines here [link no longer available]. “Never fear,” they told us. “We care about privacy. We really care! And so we promise we won’t store the images.”
So much for that promise. From CNET:
Is it Illegal to Post an Image of the FBI’s Seal?
According to CNN:
The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation has threatened Wikipedia with legal action if the online encyclopedia doesn’t remove the FBI’s seal from its site.
The seal is featured in an encyclopedia entry about the FBI.
Wikipedia isn’t backing down, however. The online encyclopedia — which is run by a nonprofit group and is edited by the public — sent a chiding letter to the FBI, explaining why, in its view, the FBI is off its legal rocker.
The Star Wars Kid Strikes Back
In The Future of Reputation, I wrote about the Star Wars Kid, the teenager who made a video of himself pretending to fight with a lightsaber. The video was uploaded to the Web without his consent, and he was ridiculed around the world, his video being downloaded tens of millions of times.
For years, nobody knew what happened to him. A news article now reports:
Is Judicial Neutrality Possible? A Response to Lawrence Solum
Earlier today, I posted my thoughts about how to fix the Supreme Court nomination process, and I wrote:
Are Confidentiality Contracts Enforceable? Tiger Woods, Elin Nordegren, and Paying for Silence
The NY Daily News reports on rumors of a potential $750 million divorce settlement proposal in the impending divorce of Tiger Woods and Elin Nordegren: