Privacy Concerns Pushed to Front Lines

Feds must explore, explain any effect on privacy by new policies or practices, under pending legislation.

Michelle Madigan, Medill News Service

WASHINGTON--Government agencies are accustomed to assessing the environmental impact of actions when appropriate; soon, they may have to assess the impact of new policies and requirements on privacy.

Federal agencies must publish a "privacy impact analysis" when introducing new regulations, under a measure that passed the House on Monday. The bill, approved on a voice vote, would require federal agencies to conduct a fair and objective evaluation of the proposed rule's impact on personal privacy, assessing how the government would collect, maintain, and protect personal information.

The requirement will "force the government to consider privacy and the ramifications of its policy before privacy is breached," says Katie Korrigan, legislative counsel to the American Civil Liberties Union. "Once you disclose personal information, it's hard to turn the clock back."

The legislation, introduced by Representative Bob Barr (R-Georgia), still must gain Senate approval before Congress adjourns this month to become law. A similar bill, introduced in May by Senator Max Cleland (D-Georgia), is already pending in the Senate, and is being considered by the Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs.

Broad Application

Barr's legislation applies to any agency that engages in surveillance, and to any government agency that maintains databases of personal information. It imposes the privacy assessment on agencies that use tracking devices to monitor online activity; it also applies to the use of other surveillance technology, such as facial recognition software, video cameras in public places, and cameras that monitor traffic intersections.

"Too often privacy is an afterthought in the development of policy," says the ACLU's Korrigan, calling the bill "a moderate and balanced approach to address the issue."

In addition, the bill would apply to global position satellite technologies that can be used to monitor a range of personal public and private activity.

"We need to be concerned about the impact of these technologies on privacy," says Lee Tien, senior counsel at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Agencies need to "step back and take a count of the privacy costs they are inflicting on people."

The issue gained new interest in the wake of new surveillance measures imposed in the domestic defense efforts against terror attacks.

Only a Start?

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the bill would not have a significant financial effect, so agencies should be able to begin following the provision promptly, advocates say.

"This has never been done in a systematic fashion," says Tien. "This bill begins that process.a?| It puts the agency on record and forces some degree of quality in this decision process."

Korrigan says that since many companies are already hiring privacy officers, it's about time the federal government stepped up to the plate.

This is a "very important step to getting the federal government polices privacy-protected," Korrigan says.