Resources
- Identity Use Cases & Scenarios.
- FIDIS Deliverables.
- Identity of Identity.
- Interoperability.
- Profiling.
- Forensic Implications.
- HighTechID.
- D3.1: Overview on IMS.
- D3.2: A study on PKI and biometrics.
- D3.3: Study on Mobile Identity Management.
- D3.5: Workshop on ID-Documents.
- D3.6: Study on ID Documents.
- D3.7: A Structured Collection on RFID Literature.
- D3.8: Study on protocols with respect to identity and identification – an insight on network protocols and privacy-aware communication.
- D3.9: Study on the Impact of Trusted Computing on Identity and Identity Management.
- D3.10: Biometrics in identity management.
- D3.11: Report on the Maintenance of the IMS Database.
- D3.15: Report on the Maintenance of the ISM Database.
- D3.17: Identity Management Systems – recent developments.
- D12.1: Integrated Workshop on Emerging AmI Technologies.
- D12.2: Study on Emerging AmI Technologies.
- D12.3: A Holistic Privacy Framework for RFID Applications.
- D12.4: Integrated Workshop on Emerging AmI.
- D12.5: Use cases and scenarios of emerging technologies.
- D12.6: A Study on ICT Implants.
- D12.7: Identity-related Crime in Europe – Big Problem or Big Hype?.
- D12.10: Normality Mining: Results from a Tracking Study.
- Privacy and legal-social content.
- Mobility and Identity.
- Other.
- IDIS Journal.
- FIDIS Interactive.
- Press & Events.
- In-House Journal.
- Booklets
- Identity in a Networked World.
- Identity R/Evolution.
Introduction
In this chapter, we will assess some of the new and emerging technologies described in chapter from a legal and ethical viewpoint. The starting point for this short prospective analysis will be twofold: we will only assess some of the emerging technologies on the basis of the European Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms and we will assess or rather challenge such technologies with an exercise of questions and remarks instead of with answers. Our approach can thus be called an approach of ‘infoethics’.
There are many good reasons to use the Charter to assess emerging technology. First, we think that fundamental rights and freedoms in general have been approached too little in analyses with regard to future and emerging technologies so far, although all fundamental rights and freedoms - and not alone a right to privacy - are paramount for our Western even intercontinental concept of identity; the scope of the articles in the Charter will show that the possible problems and issues regarding human rights and freedoms go so much further than the actual - sometimes artificial - privacy perspectives alone. This FIDIS deliverable offers us the great opportunity to take up other rights and freedoms included in the Charter that will play an important role with the introduction of new technologies in society, such as the right to human dignity, to the integrity of the person, the presumption of innocence, the prohibition of slavery, the freedom of assembly, of speech etc. Second, the Charter differs somehow from other international legal texts since it clearly puts a European stamp on rights and freedoms by including chapters on ‘solidarity’ and ‘equality’ that have more intercultural and social aspects (so-called third generation rights, in articles on cultural diversity, integration of persons with disabilities, right to access to services of general economic interest, social assistance, health care, environmental protection…). Thirdly, however, the Charter does not lead us away at all from important questions regarding privacy, data protection, intellectual property and consumer protection, because all these rights are maybe abstractly but nevertheless explicitly included in it. Fourthly, the Charter being written in more abstract language and consisting of articles that are rather promising than concretely and immediately applicable and enforceable, such a general formulation of rights and freedoms allows to approach emerging technology also from a more abstract and conceptual view: at the stage of development, this more abstract approach may be a better approach than rather anticipating concrete and often specific case-related cases that do not have a general impact on the EU policies.
Why asking questions while not trying to give a concrete answer? Of course, the main reason is that it is too early (and maybe too presumptuous) to give legal answers for emerging technologies that are (as we at least assume) not or not completely deployed in the information society market yet. By then, technology may change and adapt to fit so that the answers of today are not valid any more tomorrow. Will interconnected RFID readers ever be placed in streets and shopping centres to read out the identity of people? If yes, what will be read and where will such information be stored, and who will have access to such information in which circumstances? Will we ever be able to detect emotions or criminal thoughts through BCIs? Will there exist one database with the biometric templates of all people to which all private access controls in a city are linked? To what extent will our life and online identity development depend on Grid computing? However, the ethical and legal questions will be implicitly based on certain pictures or scenarios we make in our dreams of the future information society. Scenarios are only imaginative stories about what the future might be like and help us to plan: they are not predictions, but tools for preparation [Garreau (2004)]. They can “anchor the design process, at the same time as evoking reflection, and focus that reflection on situations of use, both as they occur in the real world and in the future” [Welen et al. (2004)]. Finally, questions may sometimes survive much longer and have a more profound impact on the awareness of scientists and policy makers. At the end, discovering questions that seem to always return when looking at new technologies may provide us with a broader picture that can be much more useful. And that is what we try to achieve in this chapter.
We will base thus our analysis on some of the emerging technologies already described in this deliverable. The Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms consists of five chapters which are entitled Dignity, Freedoms, Equality, Solidarity, Citizens’ Rights and Justice. It contains a total of 54 articles and it can be consulted directly online. We will indicate for a technology one or more specific articles for which questions may arise. This overview is far from exhaustive; it is rather meant as a starting point for contemplation.
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