Quotes from Raymond Wacks

the perhaps rather prosaic truth that law is an imperfect yet indispensable vehicle by which both to conserve and transform society

When our security is under siege, so – inevitably – is our liberty. A world in which our every movement is observed erodes the very freedom this snooping is often calculated to protect. Naturally, we need to ensure that the social costs of the means employed to enhance security do not outweigh the benefits.

Your job, your home, your relationships, your very life - and your death - all, and more, are managed, controlled and directed by the law.

One view is that privacy consists of 'limited accessibility' – a cluster of three related but independent components: secrecy: information known about an individual; anonymity: attention paid to an individual; and solitude: physical access to an individual.

Principles describe rights; policies describe goals. But rights are trumps. They have a 'threshold weight' against community goals. They should not be squashed by a competing community goal.

At the most general level, the idea of privacy embraces the desire to be left alone, free to be ourselves – uninhibited and unconstrained by the prying of others. This extends beyond snooping and unsolicited publicity to intrusions upon the 'space' we need to make intimate, personal decisions without the intrusion of the state.

The manner in which information is collected, stored, exchanged, and used has changed forever – and with it, the character of the threats to individual privacy. But while the electronic revolution touches almost every part of our lives, it is not, of course, technology itself that is the villain, but the uses to which it is put.

The concept of privacy has become too vague and unwieldy a concept to perform useful analytical work. This ambiguity has actually undermined the importance of this value and encumbered its effective protection.

In addition to its significance in liberal democratic theory, privacy stakes out a sphere for creativity, psychological wellbeing, our ability to love, forge social relationships, promote trust, intimacy, and friendship.

Westin's ubiquitous and influential idea conceives of privacy as a claim: the 'claim of individuals, groups, or institutions to determine for themselves when, how, and to what extent information about them is communicated to others'.

Among the first written codes is that of Hammurabi, king and creator of the Babylonian empire. It appeared in about 1760 bc, and is one of the earliest instances of a ruler proclaiming a systematic corpus of law to his people so that they are able to know their rights and duties.