[ExI] privacy again

[Anders Sandberg]

On 2016-03-02 18:34, spike wrote:
>
> Why does she think her exposed nudity is really worth 75 million bucks?
>
A career can be quite valuable. Top performers can produce 10-300 times 
the value of an average perfomer to a company (and would hence expect to 
get at least a fraction of that value as salary), and this is especially 
true for person-linked jobs like media careers. If somebody wrecks a 
career that might actually be worth a few million as 45-Year Earnings 
and the careerist was a top performer, then 75 million might make sense.

Also, punitive damages might show up in torts.

But the real game here is an out-of-court settlement with the hotel. The 
hotel has more to lose in terms of reputation (and hence money) than the 
nude newscaster, so it is rational to pay up a nice settlement to make 
things go away.

(Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer, just married to one. And he is working 
in a non-US jurisdiction. I am considering this from an armchair. My 
views are not valid in Idaho.)

>
> As we brought up a decade ago: it would be eeeeeasy easy to hide a 
> video device in a hotel room, almost completely without risk.  It 
> could be set up to receive a call and turn on at any time, and Skype 
> the video to any remote receiver, with very little risk of getting 
> caught and not much cost really.  So are we now saying the hotel chain 
> is responsible for find that?  In the meantime, are we cool with it 
> that all assured privacy in any public place, any public restroom and 
> any hotel room is
>
> now gone?  Could we not argue that there is no reasonable expectation 
> of privacy there?
>

http://lifehacker.com/detect-and-disable-an-airbnbs-hidden-wi-fi-cameras-with-1752817084

"Reasonable expectation of privacy" is not the same thing as being 
bug/drone/spyware free. The first is a legal term, the second is 
objective state of affairs. The first changes to some extent with 
technology and culture. But it is likely that US law regards it as 
applying to hotel rooms with some common sense limitations (hotel staff 
can in principle enter at any time, etc.) In the long run it might be 
both impossible to prevent and easy to do for so many people that 
reasonable expectation may not apply.

The issue is whether the hotel was negligent in not preventing the 
spying in the present.


-- 
Anders Sandberg
Future of Humanity Institute
Oxford Martin School
Oxford University

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