# Privacy Theater

By [Albert's Import](https://paragraph.com/@albertsimport) · 2012-04-02

privacy, regulation, government

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I wrote recently about how we are at a time during which lots of little decisions will determine whether we find ourselves in an [information utopia or dystopia](http://continuations.com/post/19677945367/choosing-our-information-based-future-utopia-or).  There is a lot of legislation in the works both here in the US and abroad that speaks directly to this.  In particular, there is a schizophrenic approach to privacy.  We are simultaneously getting efforts to provide more privacy in commercial settings and less privacy vis-a-vis the government.  In the US, the FTC is working on new [privacy regulations](http://ftc.gov/opa/2012/03/privacyframework.shtm) at the same time that the Cybersecurity bill drafts have provisions that could amount to [enormous backdoors into consumer data](https://www.cdt.org/blogs/greg-nojeim/2803cybersecuritys-8-step-plan-internet-freedom). The UK is doing much the same with an [even more aggressive government access bill](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-17576745).  I am beginning to think of the commercial legislation as “privacy theater” (akin to [security theate](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_theater)r) which in no small part distracts from the simultaneous attack on privacy from the government.

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*Originally published on [Albert's Import](https://paragraph.com/@albertsimport/privacy-theater)*