This is a suggested Bill of Rights for anyone seeking or using services from a company like Apple, Amazon, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Netflix, Samsung, Twitter, Verizon, Xfinity, or similar. Much of this can also be applied to use of government resources.
The need for this Bill of Rights comes from systematic violations of privacy. Tech companies often: say that they are improving their privacy, ask you to sign on to new privacy settings, ask you to opt out if you don’t like their default settings (instead of opting in), define privacy in a manner that best suits their bottom line.
We consumers should not let Amazon, Facebook, and Google define privacy. Instead we must define it ourselves, and not in an amorphous “don’t sell my data!” way, but in very specific ways that courts can defend.
To that end, I suggest cutting and pasting and using the following the next time that a tech company asks you to agree to Terms and Conditions. If the tech company does not provide such a space, email this to them and save your email. In this manner, you can protect yourself and your privacy.
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I hereby declare that __________ (this company/service) is NOT permitted to know, retain, use, or market to other companies any of my PRIVATE information or photos or videos, which include any and all such media related to, but not limited to:
a. Attorney-client conversations
b. “Big Data” modeling
c. Coitus, copulation
d. Doctor-patient conversations.
e. Education records
f. Financial information
g. Google results (see: EU law)
h. Hiring/firing criteria
i. Internet browser history
j. Job history
k. Kid pictures
l. Location-based services
m. Medical history
n. Narcotic history
o. Onanism choices
p. Private messages, emails
q. Query results
r. Romantic plans, attachments
s. Salary information
t. Toilet/bathroom activity
u. Undisclosed hiding places
v. Votes, voting
w. Witness/whistleblower protection
x. Xactly how to do your/my job
y. Your/my family history/secrets
z. Zippers-down nudity
All such media maintains the same legal status as my home under the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: it shall not be searched without a legal warrant issued by a judge. The following explains each item in more detail, calling the above-named company “X”:
Attorney-client conversations
X is not permitted to know, use, retain, or market any word or image shared between myself and an attorney. These are protected by longstanding laws of confidentiality.
Big data modeling
X is not permitted to amalgamate any or all of my search results, history, activity, locations, words, and images to create any sort of “profile” to be distributed to any other parties.
Coitus/copulation
X is not permitted to know, use, retain, or market any word or image that relates to my intimate relations with any partner.
Doctor-patient conversations
X is not permitted to know, use, retain, or market any word or image shared between myself and a doctor, therapist, or psychologist. These are protected by longstanding laws of confidentiality.
Education records
X is not permitted to know, use, retain, or market any grades or marks or evaluations that I have received, including the words in the content of said evaluations.
Financial records
X is not permitted to know, use, retain, or market any of my financial information or records, including but not limited to credit card information, tax records, and Social Security numbers. Any such retention or redistribution is a crime.
Google results
X is not permitted to use, retain, or market any terms that I type into a search field, and nor is X permitted to use, retain, or market, in connection with me, words that come up when googling my name. With regards to my personal information, X should consider itself bound by legal precedents established by the European Union’s “Right to be forgotten.”
Hiring/firing criteria
X is not permitted to know, use, retain, market, or search for any terms, words, or images related to why I may or may not have been hired or fired from any other company, or why I was accepted or rejected by any school. If X is interested, X can email my previous supervisors/committees and ask them questions.
Internet browser history
X is not permitted to know, use, retain, or market my history of internet searches. X should not be familiar with any such searches and should not collect or have any data related to them.
Job history
X is not permitted to use, retain, or market any aspects of my previous employment history, including but not limited to terms from my CV/résumé.
Kid pictures
X is not permitted to use, retain, or market any photos of children (minors, defined as under 18 years old) that are in my phone, on my personal computer, or that I have posted or liked or associated with in any way.
Location-based services
X is not permitted to follow me, track me, or know where I am unless I have very explicitly revealed my location to X. X is certainly not permitted to use, retain, or market my location; for example, if I am near a certain café, X is not permitted to somehow use that data point as part of selling something to me or to that café.
Medical history
X is not permitted to know, use, retain, or market any of my medical information in any way; X should not know anything about my medical history unless I provide explicit information to X.
Narcotic history
X is not permitted to know, use, retain, or market any of my history using legal and/or illegal drugs/medication in any way; X should not know anything about my narcotic history unless I provide explicit information to X.
Onanism
X is not permitted to know, use, retain, or market any of my personal, private choices regarding self-stimulation.
Private messages
X is not permitted to know, use, retain, or market any words or images that are part of my private messages to friends, associates, coworkers, relatives, or the like. As one example, if I write “Yosemite” in a private message, X is not permitted to send me ads for Yosemite, nor to tell Yosemite about me.
Query results
X is not permitted to retain or market to third parties any terms that I type into its own search field. Anything I search for should be limited to that day’s searches and not retained for future use.
Romantic plans, attachments
X is not permitted to build models based on X’s opinion (or algorithm) of my romantic preferences; X is not permitted to suggest romantic plans or attachments for me; X is not permitted to “out” me as seeking any particular partner or type of partner.
Salary information
X is not permitted to know or use or retain how much money I earn or have earned.
Toilet/bathroom information
X is not permitted to follow me into the bathroom in any way, shape, or form; X is not permitted to know, use, retain, or market any information regarding anything I do in a bathroom.
Undisclosed hiding places
X is not permitted to know, use, retain, or market any real-world locations where I keep things hidden.
Votes, voting
X is not permitted to know, use, retain, or market my vote or past votes in federal, state, county, district, and city elections. X may, if it wishes, access publicly available information about my votes.
Witness/whistleblower protection
X is not permitted to use, retain, market, or deploy my data as part of any kind of criminal case or investigation, without explicit written orders from a judge under standard Fourth Amendment protections.
Xactly how to do my job
X is not permitted to gather together my data to model how to do my job or render me superfluous.
Your/my family secrets
X is not permitted to use, retain, or market my family history, including but not limited to my DNA and family secrets.
Zippers-down nudity
X is not permitted to use, retain or market any images of naked human genitalia that I have seen or liked or transmitted on the internet.