LFI Course Materials 2020/Week four
Contents
Week 4: Privacy rights
- Real time lecture: March 30th, 11 Pacific/2 Eastern
Overview
People in the United States technically have a right to privacy guaranteed in the constitution. In practice, the privacy rights of marginalized people have been historically violated. As Angela Davis said, “ If they come for me in the morning, they will come for you in the night”, and today in the post-Snowden world, it’s true that we’re all experiencing the loss of our privacy rights. This is of course now doubly true for marginalized people, who are under even more intense surveillance than ever before. This week, we'll hear from attorney Abi Hassen from the Black Movement Law Project who will about our privacy rights, how they actually work out in practice, and what we can do about this.
Readings
- Coronavirus and escalating surveillance: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/23/technology/coronavirus-surveillance-tracking-privacy.html
- The ACLU’s resources on internet privacy (read through some of the subtopics, reports, blogs, and so on) https://www.aclu.org/issues/privacy-technology/internet-privacy
- EFF’s take on how librarians should be protecting privacy rights in the library:
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2016/12/librarians-act-now-protect-your-users-its-too-late
- Library records privacy laws by state: http://www.ala.org/advocacy/privacy/statelaws
Guest lecturer
Abi Hassen, Black Movement Law Project
Discussion
- How are your communities affected by the loss of privacy rights?
- How are you already seeing privacy rights eroded by the pandemic?
- How else do you think things are likely to change?
- What can we do about it?
Tasks
- Lecture, readings, discussion forum, and small group work
- Download Signal, and let Alison know when you do. She'll add you to the LFI Cohort 3 Signal group.
