Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request From: Jerry Leichter Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: A Thesis on Caller ID Message-ID: <10740@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 11 Aug 90 13:51:09 GMT Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Organization: TELECOM Digest Lines: 61 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 562, Message 2 of 6 Your ethicist is demonstrating how easy it is to get the answer you want if you just can choose the question. His argument falls apart on close exami- nation. a) He pulls at the emotional heartstrings of "privacy in your own home" to try to argue for Caller-ID. However, virtually all the complaints about invasions of privacy have had to do with potential abuses by BUSINESSES. Clear black-and-white dicotomies - public vs. private places - are nice for arguments, but have little to do with reality. When I go into a store, I give up very few of my privacy rights. A store is not someone's home: It's a place of business, and falls somewhere between public and private. For example, you can if you wish choose to refuse to allow black people into your home. You cannot choose to bar them from your store. By offering services to the public, you have given up certain privacy rights. Conversely, I as a member of the public retain many more of my privacy rights in your store than I do in your home. In particular, you can certainly demand to know who I am before allowing me into your home. You cannot demand identification as a pre-condition for allowing me into your store. All you can get from this argument is that NON-BUSINESS lines have a right to receive Caller-ID. For all their talk about protecting people's privacy, the telco's REALLY want to sell Caller-ID to, you got it, businesses. That's where the money is. b) Even if we restrict ourselves to private homes and non-business lines, his argument is weak. I have the right to knock on your front door. You don't have to let me in unless I identify myself, but you can't stop me from knock- ing. I don't believe a "no solicitors" sign has any legal weight. (A "no trespassing" sign MIGHT - although I can't enforce it selectively, letting some people in without invitation and choosing to go after others.) I'll argue that the knock on the door and the ring of the telephone are equal invasions of privacy. In each case, you have the right to ask for identifica- tion. In each case, I can refuse to provide it - in which case you can close the door or hang up the phone. That's as far as your rights go if I refuse to identify myself. In telephony terms, this means that I should have the right to send my ID or not; and you have the right to receive it, and refuse to answer if I didn't send it. (A better analogy - and a better Caller-ID system, though perhaps technically impractical - would be a button or setting on your phone that explicity asked for Caller-ID. I would receive a notification of the request and could choose to allow my identification to be sent, or not. This would be the electronic analogue of your asking for my name - except that I would be unable to lie about it.) BTW, the analogy of the "no solicitors" sign is your ability to say that you don't want any telemarketing calls. In the past, you've had no way to enforce this. The bill just passed by Congress, requiring that telemarketers respect a list of "no calls" numbers, provides exactly this ability. Jerry