Synthesis Essay On Right To Privacy

Privacy is the main concern for average citizens and it’s growing to be more complicated day by day. In today’s digital world, the private life of the average citizen is stored digitally on various electronic devices. There are several threats that can expose anyone’s privacy resulting in undesired harm to one’s identity and life. Laws to protect that from happening are more than necessary and they are needed now more than ever. But that leaves us with one question – Is our 226 years old constitution able to provide the protection that present demands? In short, the answer is – No.

The first ever clause that, addressed the issues of privacy was introduced in the Bill of Rights in the form of 3rd and 4th Amendment. These amendments are interpreted to be the source of protection of privacy for the citizens. A simple search in the US Constitution electronic file reveals that the actual term “privacy” has never been used in the constitution itself. The only thing that protects the privacy is the definition of personal property which has been loosely

interpreted over the years. This poses a major threat to the modern citizens. They face the issue of suffering from identity theft, personal information being stolen and sold on the black market and hacking by foreign and domestic spy agencies. The issues of identity theft are treated as a crime and are subject to prosecution under Identity Theft and Assumption Deterrence Act of 1998[1].
The act mentioned above sounds reassuring since it addresses the issue of personal identity being stolen and used for wrongful purposes.

But then there is a standing issue of government spying. After the unfortunate events of September 11, 2001, the government implemented rigorous regulations to stop future happenings of similar kind. The Patriot Act was passed in October 2001 and its provisions allowed the government to conduct unsupervised surveillance on the electronic communications and records. The government has used this to collect data from the citizens over the course of several years. This act has allowed the government to add exceptions to the meaning of 4th Amendment like ruling out the requirement of ‘probable cause’ and conduct illegitimate searches. It directly violates the rights of, us citizens, provided by the constitution. The legislative branch has failed to uphold the rights of the

citizens.
Edward Snowden, a former National Security Agency (NSA) employee leaked hundreds of thousand classified documents in May 2013. It was a revealing moment for the citizens of USA and sparked the debate of electronic privacy. The documents revealed the malpractices of the NSA and its counterparts that were unconstitutional. Since then, Information Privacy and Government Surveillance have become topics of many debates. It is terrifying to learn about the behavior of secret agencies at home yet it has made us aware about the current conditions and much-needed revisions to the constitution. In response to this national concern, the Congress passed USA Freedom Act in June 2015 which renewed or restored certain provisions of the Patriot Act that were expired with the exception of few minor exclusions. The government still possesses the power to eavesdrop on the electronic communication and conduct wiretaps without a need to show probable cause. This all happened despite bipartisan majority’s support for “closing the backdoor” [2] surveillance and legislation terms that were “carefully and painstakingly negotiated” [2] between House Judiciary Committee and House Intelligence Committee against mass surveillance activities.
The 4th Amendment to the US Constitution assures the protection from privacy invasion. But at the time of creation, the only things that it applied to were the houses, personal documents and papers and other tangible things. With the rise of digital age, most of the information related to those things is available on the internet. The government’s suspicious actions baffle the citizens since secretly checking on them is an invasion of privacy, but the loose interpretation of the 4th Amendment has allowed them to get away with it. In 1890, Louis Brandeis a Harvard Law School graduate and a lawyer who later served as associate justice of Supreme Court, co-authored an article named The Right to Privacy. It has been regarded as one of the most accurate and influential articles concerning the definition of “right to privacy” in the constitution that resonates with our modern needs. He wrote: “…the individual shall have full protection in person and in property is a principle as old as the common law; but it has been found necessary from time to time to define anew the exact nature and extent of such protection.” [3] The article clearly states that the laws need to be redefined to adjust them according to the change in demands of time. We are at a point where the “privacy” and “personal property” need to be redefined to ensure the continuity in freedom as guaranteed by the constitution.
Protecting the country and its interests are essential for the serving government, but to accomplish that the government must not put the citizen’s rights and purpose of the US Constitution in jeopardy. Right to digital privacy is an ongoing concern. Even though the constitution has interpreted basic definitions and rights to privacy, the present day acts have allowed the government to disengage from protecting those rights. All the issues concerning digital privacy have been resolved based on the previous court cases. But now is the right time to amend the constitution to bring it up to pace with the modern world. Digital age and modern technology are here to stay and they are inevitable part of the future, so the definitions that directly interpret the digital privacy and technology must be added to ensure the longevity of the ‘supreme law of the land’. [4]