A bill of rights for the digital age

In 1996, John Perry Barlow published “A Declaration of the Independence of the Internet,” a paper condemning government involvement in the internet.

Mr. Barlow, who died in 2018, was a writer, Grateful Dead lyricist and a founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a group dedicated to protecting digital rights. He wrote the widely copied piece in response to passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which he felt was government interference in the net.

Lately I’ve been thinking about our rights in the Internet Age and decided to compose a Bill of Rights for Living in the Digital World. I expect few will take notice, and I certainly have never written lyrics for the Grateful Dead, but I needed to get these things off my chest. So here goes.

I own my personal information and no entity has the right to collect it without my permission. If I do give permission, I have full access to all information collected and the right to have it deleted.

My information cannot be given or sold to any third party without my permission.

I have a right to surf the internet without being tracked.

I have a right to go where I please in complete anonymity. No one should access my phone location data or records of where my phone is connecting to cell towers without my permission. If law enforcement or the government wants the information, a warrant should be required.

I have the right to walk the public streets or take part in protests without being identified by a camera and picked out by facial recognition.

I have a right to drive my car on public streets without my license plate being scanned and its location time-stamped and digitally stored by police.

I have a right to communicate by telephone, email or text message without the content being captured and stored by the federal government (NSA).

I have a right to an email account without being bombarded by spammers and scammers.

I have a right to peace in my home without constant phone calls from scammers and spammers. For any calls I receive, my telephone should report the actual number the call originates from so I can block it. I have a right to be part of a government no-call list that is not a joke.

I have a right of access to high-speed broadband internet service at a reasonable price no matter my income or address. There should be almost no locations I can live that are “off the grid” unless I wish to be.

I have a right to net neutrality — a guarantee that websites be treated equally and there be no “fast lanes” for people who can pay more.

I have a right to cast my vote without being influenced by “fake news” promulgated by friends of a candidate or enemies of the state.

I have a right for any personal information, particularly my credit card number, to be fully protected from hackers and criminals by anyone who has collected and stored it.

Will claiming such rights make any difference? Unlikely, although the effort can be encouraged by citizens telling federal and state representatives of their support for privacy legislation and refusing to deal with (accepting free services from) businesses that deal in personal information.

There, I feel better.