New Connecticut Privacy Guide Reflects Technology Advances

In terms of technology, we've come a long way in the past decade. That can be a good thing if you're a big fan of Kindles or iPads, make use of the latest e-discovery software, or your life was saved by cutting-edge surgery performed by robots. But to those worried about privacy issues, the technological advances can be problematic.

And so lawyers and laymen alike might be interested to hear about a newly released guide by the American Civil Liberties Union of Connecticut that explains privacy rights on a state and federal level, identifying areas where those rights are threatened. The 130-page guide, researched and written by attorney Robert Schultz and other ACLU members, is an update of the 2003 publication, "Privacy Rights in Connecticut."

"The 2003 guide was very different; it was a more limited document in terms of how much it addressed," said Sandra Staub, the state ACLU's legal director and co-editor of the guide.

From the very start of the guide, the main point is that the law is not keeping up with technological advances, including surveillance cameras, wiretapping, GPS tracking, drug-testing techniques and DNA use in identifying crime suspects, among others examples.

Staub continued: "There are so many areas of concern that we thought it was important to update [and] expand the guide so that people in Connecticut know what their rights to privacy are. People often talk about 'a right to privacy,' but they don't understand where that comes from."

First Amendment lawyer Daniel J. Klau, of McElroy, Deutsch, Mulvaney & Carpenter, who helped craft the 2003 guide, said it is essential to provide the public with a book to flip through "to get a sense of what types of protections are out there."

"It's an extraordinary resource for legal practitioners and people with a general interest in privacy issues," Klau said. "I've always held a copy as a lawyer because there are certain types of issues and questions that come up around the water cooler."

These types of questions — Can my employer monitor my email? Can I keep a recording device with me? Is it OK for the police to pull up my driving history online after scanning my license plate?—have already begun confronting the legal community in the form of Fourth Amendment issues.

Law governing privacy, said Staub, "is governed by what is called a 'reasonable expectation of privacy.'" But nearly 50 years after the "reasonable expectation" standard was set forth, reasonable people still disagree on what it means. And that keeps privacy law in a constant state of flux.

'Overhaul Needed'

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