I'm finding myself in the very strange position of feeling sorry for Paris Hilton. Okay, yes, she's a media whore in every sense of the word, and dresses only slightly better than this woman. Some would say that the thousands of web pages documenting her poorly-lit sex tapes, sartorial foibles and conversational hiccups are exactly what she deserves. But with the Sidekick drama unfolding, we may have to rethink what does, and does not, comprise a reasonable expectation of privacy, for someone as apparently unconcerned about it as Paris - and for the rest of us as well.
If you haven't heard, the hotel heiress was either allegedly duped into giving up her T-Mobile Sidekick account information to someone with clearly dubious intentions, or her account was hacked via more sinister technological means. Logs of her SMS text messages and stored cameraphone pix have now been broadcast everywhere. Alien astronomers performing a spectrographic analysis of data transmissions from planet Earth this week would have undoubtedly seen a gaudy electromagnetic pink-and-platinum ring leaving our atmosphere, threatening to engulf the universe.
The questions I've got for you lawyers out there are these: while it's clearly too late for Paris to get those pictures back, does she have any recourse at all, assuming she can track down the individuals responsible? Does the alleged inadvertent handing-over of her login information comprise a tacit approval for the (mis)use of the info and images contained therein? Can public figures (especially those of Paris Hilton's curious meta-celebrity nature) retain any rights to privacy? Does the pilfering of the pix and logs violate any telecom law? Do even these materials, so clearly unintended for public consumption, still fall under the purview of the public interest?
Law-pimp Postscript and I were having a conversation recently regarding whether or not telecom companies had a responsibility, legally or ethically, to reveal the identities of individuals sought by law enforcement for copyright violations or other criminal acts - whether the business conducted between customer and provider were as private as the conversations/data transmissions those transactions facilitated. Right now, if I got the gist of his argument correctly, few phone/internet service contracts provide for such protections - though the argument could be made that the market will dictate an inclusion of such protections as privacy concerns escalate (though how those contractual obligations will hold up against the legal juggernaut of Homeland Security is anyone's guess.)
While I support the efforts of law enforcement (even their headline-grabbing, idiotic pursuit of Metallica fans trying to save a little cash), it seems as if these practical pursuits, as well as the development of a relatively recent, seemingly society-wide confessional-exhibitionist streak, are promoting an erosion of respect for privacy rights, on an emotional level, for the nation at large. We wouldn't even be having this discussion if the messages and digital pix were instead letters and photographs removed from albums and desk drawers by a housekeeper or ex-boyfriend with a spare key. It seems to me we wouldn't even be having this discussion if our penchant for reality-based television, memoir and tell-alls hadn't reached fever pitch in the last few years. And none of this woulda happened at all if Al Gore hadn't gone and invented that damn Internet. Crazy-ass chump.
I don't understand how easier access to the information we choose to withhold from other people makes the sanctity of that information any less relevant.
Even Paris Hilton - yes, Paris Hilton - deserves a portion of her life to belong only to her - even if the boundaries of such begin and end at the keypad of her cell phone. It could happen to any one of us - and you and I don't have the luxury of an nine-figure inheritance to take the edge off embarrassment on a global scale. In a way, we are all Paris Hiltons - living to keep private certain things in a world increasingly interested in exposing them in service of truths disproportionate to the pain their exposure causes.
Hopefully, however, the rest of us are less likely to wear super-low-rise jeans and mesh tank tops to work.
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