NEGATIVE/AFFIRMATIVE – POLITICAL & ELECTION ISSUES 212

NEGATIVE/AFFIRMATIVE — POLITICAL & ELECTION ISSUES 212

PRIVACY IS A VERY IMPORTANT ISSUE FOR VOTERS

PRIVACY WILL BECOME A DOMINANT ISSUE IN THE NEAR TERM

Tom Regan The Christian Science Monitor January 27, 2000, SECTION: FEATURES; BOOKS; Pg. 17 TITLE: Don't look now, but we know all about you // acs-EE2001

Garfinkel's book comes at a good time. Many experts believe that privacy and security issues will ultimately dwarf the Y2K hysteria of the past two years. "Database Nation" gives a way to detect the privacy land mines in our culture and ultimately disarm them.

PRIVACY IS A POWERFUL PUBLIC ISSUE WAITING FOR A CHAMPION

WILLIAM SAFIRE; The Houston Chronicle, September 24, 1999, SECTION: A; Pg. 38 TITLE: Consumer faces growing invasion of privacy // acs-EE2001

The groundswelling resentment is in search of a public champion. The start will gain momentum when some presidential candidate seizes the sleeper issue of the too- targeted consumer. Laws need not always be the answer: to avert regulation, smart businesses will compete to assure customers' right to decide.

POLLS SHOW VOTERS STRONGLY COMMITTED TO PRIVACY PROTECTION

Conrad deFiebre; Star Tribune Star Tribune (Minneapolis, MN) January 9, 2000, SECTION: NEWS; Pg. 1A // acs-EE2001

"This is the biggest issue popping up all over the country," Hatch said. "Everybody's waking up to it."

That doesn't mean, however, that it's the first thing on everyone's mind. Few respondents to public-opinion polls volunteer invasion of privacy as a major problem for society.

But when poll respondents are prompted, Hatch says, they react strongly to privacy issues. He says DFL candidates' emphasis of privacy issues was a key to their victories in two recent outstate Senate special elections.

"Privacy has suddenly become good politics," said Don Gemberling, the state's information policy director.

AMERICANS ARE OUTRAGED BY LOSSES OF PRIVACY

DENVER ROCKY MOUNTAIN NEWS, July 9, 1999, SECTION: Editorial; Ed. FINAL; Pg. 61A TITLE: TARGETING PRIVACY PIRATES THE ISSUE: PRIVATE PROBES DONE UNDER FALSE PRETENSES OUR VIEW: LAWS SHOULD PROTECT CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION // acs-EE2001

Most Americans value their privacy, and are unpleasantly surprised when they discover how little of it they really enjoy in an era of computerized records and interlinked databases.

They are downright indignant at the idea that someone may use trickery and deception to get confidential information from all those files - and that there may be nothing at all, legally, they can do about it.

PRIVACY ISSUES ARE A POWERFUL POLITICAL SLEEPER FORCE

WILLIAM SAFIRE; The Houston Chronicle, September 24, 1999, SECTION: A; Pg. 38 TITLE: Consumer faces growing invasion of privacy // acs-EE2001

We are dealing here with a political sleeper issue. People are getting wise to being secretly examined and manipulated and it rubs them the wrong way.

Politicians sense that a strange dissonance is agitating their constituents. But most are leery of the issue because it cuts across ideologies and party lines - not just encrypted communication vs. national security, but personal liberty vs. the free market.

AMERICANS ARE PAYING MORE ATTENTION TO PRIVACY THAN ANY OTHER ISSUE

Barbara Young, senior vice president of the Financial & Professional Services Group of Shandwick-Minneapolis, Star Tribune (Minneapolis, MN) March 20, 2000, SECTION: BUSINESS; Pg. 3D TITLE: The thundering privacy train; Unless some of the steam is let out of this issue, businesses, consumers and the economy all could be derailed // acs-VT2001

Shandwick International's opinion research firm, SWR Worldwide, recently conducted a survey that found Americans are paying more attention to, and are more concerned about, privacy than any other issue _ more than the presidential elections, computer hacking or even the "Who Wants to be a Millionaire" show.

Pick up any business magazine or daily newspaper or watch the evening news, and privacy is guaranteed to be a topic.

Governments are reactive institutions and are now scrambling to react. There are 1,300 separate pieces of state legislation on the books and, at last count, another 50 bills on Capitol Hill. The Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Reserve are drafting their own privacy initiatives. The Clinton administration just cut a deal with the European Union on data privacy, and recently warned Internet companies that dot-coms are not moving fast enough to ensure consumer privacy online.

INTERNET PRIVACY IS THE MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE TO THE PUBLIC

- Privacy on the Internet ranked as the No. 1 news story of interest, beating out computer hackers, Internet taxes, the Diallo case, the drop in the Dow and the "Marry A Millionaire" story. (SWR Worldwide survey)

- More than 85 percent of online users regarded the privacy of information transmitted online as the most important issue on the Internet. (@plan Internet Poll)