If we lose our privacy, do we also lose our humanity? It might seem an odd question to ask in the week when Max Mosley looks set to win his case against the News of the World for their lurid allegations about his sexual activities. Yesterday the Centre for Policy Studies held a seminar to examine the right to a private life; noted human rights lawyer Jonathan Cooper OBE explained the history of privacy law, a concept largely neglected by the English legal system and now reliant on the European Convention on Human Rights. As the law gradually develops a more detailed definition of privacy rights, clearly we need a balance between legitimate public interest and the right of public figures to a private life.
But what about the rest of us? We might not be at risk of paparazzi intrusion, but the 'surveillance society' requires ordinary citizens increasingly to surrender their privacy to agencies of the State. Is it alarmist to care about this? I don't think so. The more data the government collects, the more it seeks to define and manage our identities, the less we are able to call any part of our lives our own. In Cooper's words "It is the everyday quality of the right to private life that makes its protection so important within the human rights lexicon." And maybe it's one of those things you don't think about much - until you lose it.
