The End of Privacy? Not Yet

  • Photograph by Peter Hapak for TIME

    Most people believe in the right to privacy, and nearly as many believe this right is enshrined in the Constitution. It's not--at least, not explicitly. The Supreme Court has found that other rights contained in the First, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth and 14th Amendments imply a certain right to privacy, which protects us from government intrusion into our lives. But what if we choose to live our lives in a glass box? Do we voluntarily give up any right to privacy? What is privacy in an era when technology has made traditional notions of it seem obsolete?

    Joel Stein's cover story on how our online data is being bought and sold highlights one of the most vexing issues of our time: the tension between privacy and convenience. With an abundance of examples, Joel--not the most private person--shows how we willingly give up personal data in exchange for the ease of online shopping, information searches and updates on the marital statuses of our friends. The Internet has changed both individuals' and society's definition of privacy. Privacy isn't dead, but it's evolving. The old saying was that your name should be in the newspaper (an antique notion right there) only two times in your life: when you're born and when you die. But today a private person is often defined as someone who has fine-tuned her Facebook settings. Congress is looking at privacy controls and data-mining practices, as well it should. But the idea is not to guarantee our privacy so much as it is to guarantee our right to control the information about us that is gathered and sold. And as Joel shows, technology works both ways. Yes, people can track us, but we can also track the trackers.

    Richard Stengel, MANAGING EDITOR