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Re: [IAB] Call for Comment: 'Privacy Considerations for Internet Protocols'

2013-02-25 14:08:45
Hi Hector,

Just to clarify, do you mean ownership of personal data? Or something else?

Thanks,
Alissa

On Feb 25, 2013, at 2:55 PM, Hector Santos wrote:

Hi,

Related to your question, if it wasn't done already, I think there is one 
item to consider  or define - $Owner(s) and/or $Ownership. (I don't see any 
terms like owner, ownership in this document). The US ECPA has evolved with 
additional new laws, some as the "Good Samaritan" provisions, relaxations and 
also there has been new challenges and in my assessment it was primarily 
based on long adhered ownership principles. Just like employers enjoyed many 
US ECPA privacy exemptions, the Googles, Facebooks and other 3rd party 
service bureaus have also used "ownership" justify their leveraging of user 
data - "its our network and equipment...."

I think the $intermediary term touches base, but i don't see it describe nor 
the $initiator being related to the owner of things.

Ownership is very fundamental when we look at  the natural ethical design 
considerations, this should be one of the tenets of the document, in my view. 
 Recognized ownership has a very vital effect on what a protocol 
may|can|should offer or not offer as to not open Pandora's box.

--
HLS

On 2/24/2013 2:23 PM, Hannes Tschofenig wrote:
Hi Hector,


On Feb 23, 2013, at 9:51 PM, Hector Santos wrote:

Hi, with a quick review, and many comments and points, I think the one 
single part that I would have some questions about is in the intro:

  The guidance provided in
  this document is generic and can be used to inform the design of any
  protocol to be used anywhere in the world, without reference to
  specific legal frameworks.


Is that a goal?
Yes, that's the goal.

As you know, the IETF develops specifications that are used on the Internet 
and not just in a specific region. Trying to interpret national laws and to 
provide region-by-region specific guidance did not seem desirable to us.

 Do you feel you have reached providing such "Global Common" guidelines in 
the area of privacy?
Yes, I think so and this document follows the spirit of RFC 3552 "Guidelines 
for Writing RFC Text on Security Considerations". This document is 
essentially the privacy version of what RFC 3552 is for security. If you 
look at RFC 3552 you will also fail to find references to regulation on 
security matters (even though they exist).

We did look at many documents that seemed relevant input, such as the 
mentioned OECD document, and we spoke with data protection authorities and 
solicited their input. Our job would have been easier if we could have just 
re-used one of these documents listing the privacy principles. 
Unfortunately, it turns out that these documents were written for a 
different audience and that audience is supposed to have different 
capabilities regarding the design and the deployment of their services. In 
the IETF we do not have the same degree of freedom and impact and so we 
developed these guidelines to the best of our capabilities.

 How does it compare to US ECPA provisions for "User Expectations" which 
has served as a global model for other jurisdictions?
The reason I ask is because I have been very sensitive to ethical design 
and product liability issues in our product lines since 1986 following the 
guidelines set forth by the US ECPA for:

- Thou shall not block/reject things without user knowledge,
- Thou shall not tamper/edit things especially when passing things (relays),
- Thou shall kept private things private.

This was considered "Global" once upon a time.  Now its arguable.
What is interesting for us to find out whether you believe that the 
Electronic Communications Privacy Act has for additional privacy aspects we 
need to address in the document.
It is not our goal to interpret specific regulatory documents (even though 
it is interesting). This is the (well-paid) job of many lawyers.

Ciao
Hannes

--
HLS

On 2/23/2013 12:10 PM, Alissa Cooper wrote:
Hi SM,

Thanks for your comments. Some responses are inline.

On Jan 30, 2013, at 7:29 PM, SM wrote:

At 14:30 16-01-2013, IAB Chair wrote:
This is an announcement of an IETF-wide Call for Comment on 'Privacy 
Considerations for Internet Protocols'.

The document is being considered for publication as an Informational RFC 
within the IAB stream, and is available for inspection here:
http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-iab-privacy-considerations
In Section 1:

 'With regard to data, often it is a concept applied to
  "personal data," information relating to an identified or
  identifiable individual.'

I suggest rewriting the above sentence.
The authors have re-written that sentence several times and in different 
ways already. Do you have a specific suggestion about how to improve it?

 "Many sets of privacy principles and privacy design frameworks have been
  developed in different forums over the years."

There is also some work in the APEC region (see 
http://publications.apec.org/publication-detail.php?pub_id=390 (payware)).
As far as I know the APEC framework is one of many frameworks (none of 
which we cite since there are so many) based on the OECD-style FIPs. Is 
that incorrect?

As a nit, the draft-ietf-geopriv-policy-27 reference should be RFC 6772.
Fixed.

I read some of the previous versions of this draft.  The Abstract Section 
describes the document as providing guidance for developing privacy 
considerations for inclusion in protocol specifications.  I found the 
draft difficult to digest.  I suggest simplifying the draft to make the 
guidance accessible to the target audience.
I'm not quite sure what you are recommending here, but we have had 
conversations in the IAB privacy program about moving the guidance part 
up, or otherwise trying to make the focus on the guidance piece more 
prominent. The difficulty is that there is a broad range in the extent to 
which potential readers are familiar with privacy concepts, so jumping 
straight into the guidance would not be appropriate for some portion of 
the audience. If you have concrete suggestions for how to simplify, those 
would be helpful.

One of the issues nowadays is what to do about intermediaries.  If I am 
not mistaken RFC 3238 was one of the first documents to tackle that 
question from a privacy perspective.  There have been a few proposals to 
introduce intermediaries as part of the architecture (I am using the word 
is used loosely).  It is easy to argue for intermediaries based on use 
cases.  There was a case recently where the users only became aware that 
they have signed up for using an intermediary through the EULA.

The draft introduces the concept of secondary use (Section 4.2.3).  
Strictly speaking, it is a disclosure (Section 4.2.4).
Not all secondary uses involve disclosure (such as the example given in 
4.2.3). I have added a sentence to clarify this, however:

"Secondary use encompasses any use of data, including disclosure."

The draft mentions consent in several places.  The authors are likely 
aware that consent was a hot topic for DNT.  It's easier to start with 
something that is easy for the average person to understand and build 
from there.  Section 7.2 could more about consent instead of user 
participation or control.
We tried to think of a case where a consent mechanism was actually 
developed in the IETF, but as a general matter consent mechanisms tend to 
be out of scope, which is why we focus more on user controls (which still 
show up rarely but do show up).

Thanks,
Alissa

Regards,
-sm