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"That the individual shall have full protection in person
and 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."
-Samuel Warren and Louis D. Brandeis, "The Right to Privacy", Harvard Law Review, 1890. The date above is not a misprint. It was over 100 years ago that Louis D. Brandeis, who would later be appointed by Woodrow Wilson to the United States Supreme Court, and his contemporary Samuel Warren, published the seminal article in the Harvard Law Review containing this pithy and very contemporaneous warning. It was the first time that the idea of an individual's "right to privacy" had been articulated as such, and their bold stance still resonates today, bringing much to bear on the current privacy debate. Concerns about the privacy and accessibility of personal information are as real today as in Warren and Brandeis' day, arguably even more so. Developing digital security software has crystallized our understanding of the dangers inherently posed to the individual and civil society by the current lack of digital privacy protections. Continuing advances in digital technology have led to information about individuals and groups being accessed, processed and used in entirely new ways. As a result, new methods of mining and analyzing information are fundamentally transforming the persona of the individual or group to which they are being applied and will, inevitably, regulate or transform an individual's freedom of movement, access to social goods and services, self-determination and even self-conception. The digital revolution of the 21st century will radically rewrite society's view of the self in much the same way that the philosophes of the 17th century did with their views on contract, education and politics. Without an extended and renewed attempt to define, as Warren and Brandeis put it, "the exact nature and extent of [the] protection (of privacy)" the freedom we enjoy and take for granted will be severely compromised. It is our modest hope that the use of our digital privacy software will be a factor in these very important developments for society and the individual. Sincerely,
Michael Godfree |