Nothing to hide, but something to lose

Journal article

‘I have nothing to hide’ is among the most common and controversial arguments against privacy. This article shows why the argument is mistaken on its own terms. To do so, it constructs a model combining the standard economic argument – that only people with ‘something to hide’ will value privacy – with a concept of intrinsic privacy preferences and shows that the inclusion of this dimension causes the standard argument to fail. It then applies these insights to two legal contexts in which there are active policy debates: the protection of genetic information in the context of employer-provided health insurance and tax privacy.

Authors: Cofone, IN

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: University of Toronto Press
• Journal: University of Toronto Law Journal
• Volume: 70
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 64-90
• Publication date: 2019-07-24
• DOI: 10.3138/utlj.2018-0118
• EISSN: 1710-1174
• ISSN: 0042-0220
• Language: English
• Keywords: surveillance; signalling; law and economics; game theory; information privacy; privacy; employment law