Suchergebnisse

This paper focuses on the increasing use of electronic surveillance systems in hospitals and the apparent lack of awareness of the implications of these systems for privacy of the individual. The systems are used for identification and tracking of equipment, staff and patients. There has been little public comment or analysis of these systems with regard to privacy as their implementation has been driven by security issues. The systems that gather this information include video, smart card and more recently RFID systems. The system applications include tracking of vital equipment, labelling of blood and other samples, tracking of patients, new born babies and staff. These applications generate a vast amount of digital information that needs to be correctly secured to protect the privacy of the individual. Separately each type of information has value, but if this information were analysed together then the intelligence that can be gleaned from this could become a major threat to privacy and security. There are various standards and legislation that cover healthcare information, such as CCTV, but are these known and what are the compliance levels? RFID use is increasing in the hospital sector and this is being linked with the patient medical record as it is becoming core to treatment in some hospitals. The indications are that this will become normal practice which means that surveillance information from RFID systems will be linked much more closely to a patient's medical record. Managers, owners and custodians of information within hospitals need to be aware of the issues and take steps to ensure that staff are fully aware and trained in information handling practices. They also need to ensure that external parties who handle surveillance information are compliant with standards and good practice.

This study examines electronic surveillance in the workplace, by asking, "Are such practices ethical?" To address this question, classical philosophical and modern psychological approaches to ethics are used. The inquiry begins with the importance of the problem, followed by its evolution and current status. After describing the method of analysis, the article analyzes arguments for and against surveillance. Although there are no easy answers, the "Discussion" section provides a synthesis of the findings and recommendations for best practice. The conclusion summarizes the study, notes its limitations, and offers ideas for future research.

Edward Snowden's leaks published by many different media vehicles around the world have demonstrated that individuals' most basic rights might have been continuously violated, mainly their right to privacy and freedom of speech, and therefore reforms would be in need. If this presumption turns out to be true, governments and industry shall foresee citizen's requests and should protect them by establishing limitations, safeguards, oversight and accountability. Nevertheless, some of the proposed solutions up to this date might have an undesirable opposite effect, and instead of guaranteeing privacy and freedom of speech and other basic rights, they might provide tools to further violations. It is necessary to come up with internationally agreed solutions that will take into consideration not only current intrusions and damages, but also future human rights violations scenarios. These solutions must be enforced not only to governments' activities, but also to the private sector, which might perform similar violations while providing their services and the private sector. This article will advocate that despite the differences between cultures, and the distinctive approaches given to, e.g., privacy and freedom of speech, a basal framework must be in place and it must be enforced in every jurisdiction. It will advocate that most effective solution to effectively enforce these rights might be to embed by design in devices and services technologies that follow internationally agreed safeguards, limitations and protections. This might overcome ineffective oversight and lack of political will, providing a foundation to more protected environments, even when national security is at stake. Therefore, it will be argued that technology might be the best answer to assure citizens' fundamental freedoms in the digital era. It will underline that a similar methodology is currently in use by the World Trade Organization ("WTO") in matters related to food and health security, and agreements on basic privacy and data protection ...

Discussed are issues pertinent to the use of electronic surveillance in the fight against organized crime. While most law enforcement officials favor the use of wiretapping, civil libertarians regard this practice as a violation of privacy contrary to the Fourth Amendment, as well as ineffective in the prosecution of organized criminals. In a 1974 study supporting the civil liberties position, Herman Schwartz found fewer than 25% of wiretapped conversations for 1968-1970 to be incriminating, & even those did not result in a very high conviction rate, about 15% ("Six Years of Tapping and Bugging," Civil Liberties Review, 1974, 26). Kinds of surveillance are reviewed, as are current legal procedures for warranted wiretapping. Wiretapping can threaten civil liberties when used either for political purposes or illegally against criminal suspects. Of course, organized crime also threatens individual liberties. Wiretapping can be effective against organized crime when used within the provisions of the Fourth Amendment. Modified Author Summary.

"Americans have come to realize that many of us may be under surveillance at any time. It all started 150 years ago on the battlefields of the Civil War, where each side tapped the other's telegraph lines. In 1895 the NYPD began to tap telephone lines. In 1910 the dictograph arrived, making electronic surveillance easier still"--

This dissertation argues that there is an electronic surveillance gap in the employment context in Canada, a gap that is best understood as an absence of appropriate legal provisions to regulate employers' electronic surveillance of employees both inside and outside the workplace. This dissertation aims to identify and articulate principles and values that can be used to close the electronic surveillance gap in Canada and suggests that, through the synthesis of social theories of surveillance and privacy, together with analyses of privacy provisions and workplace privacy cases, a new and better workplace privacy regime can be designed. This dissertation uses both a comparative legal doctrinal methodology concerning the legal analyses of privacy provisions and workplace privacy cases, and an interdisciplinary legal methodology regarding social theories of surveillance and privacy, to examine the jurisdictions of Canada, the United States, and the European Union. The ideas generated in the analyses are used to formulate proposed provisions for a new workplace privacy regime. This dissertation indicates how these provisions can be integrated into Canada's legal system, and provides examples of legislative provisions that could form part of a new workplace privacy regime. These proposed provisions modify and add to existing data protection legislation in Canada, such as the Personal Information and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA). The result is a better balance of the privacy rights of employees with the legitimate business interests of employers through an effective closing of the electronic surveillance gap in employment. This dissertation contributes to a better appreciation of the role of electronic surveillance in employment, to a better understanding of the nature of electronic surveillance gap, and makes concrete suggestions about how the electronic surveillance gap can be closed by means of novel legislative provisions.