A Framework for Analysing Technology's Negative and Positive Impacts on Freedom and Privacy

The term 'privacy' refers to a cluster of values within the broad framework of human rights. Developments in information technologies have substantial negative impacts on all of the dimensions of privacy. Beyond the well-documented harm to personal data and personal communications, we are imposing on one another increasingly serious intrusions into the privacy of the physical person, of personal behaviour, and of personal experience. The survival of human society and polity are dependant on technology being brought under human control, through actions to prevent harmful applications, resist their implementation, and ensure robustness and resilience against their effects. Some technologies offer themselves as weapons in that battle.