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65-744: Media freedom in the European Union is a fundamental right that applies to all member states of the European Union and its citizens , as defined in the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights as well as the European Convention on Human Rights . Within the EU enlargement process, guaranteeing media freedom is named a "key indicator of a country's readiness to become part of the EU". Media freedom, including freedom of

130-463: A " strict scrutiny " review in court. In American constitutional law , fundamental rights have special significance under the U.S. Constitution . Those rights enumerated in the U.S. Constitution are recognized as "fundamental" by the U.S. Supreme Court . According to the Supreme Court, enumerated rights that are incorporated are so fundamental that any law restricting such a right must both serve

195-826: A century, with the free speech clause of the First Amendment first incorporated in 1925 in Gitlow v New York . The most recent amendment completely incorporated as fundamental was the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms for personal self-defense, in McDonald v Chicago , handed down in 2010 and the Eighth Amendment 's restrictions on excessive fines in Timbs v. Indiana in 2019. Not all clauses of all amendments have been incorporated. For example, states are not required to obey

260-680: A compelling state purpose and be narrowly tailored to that compelling purpose . The original interpretation of the United States Bill of Rights was that only the Federal Government was bound by it. In 1835, the U.S. Supreme Court in Barron v. Baltimore unanimously ruled that the Bill of Rights did not apply to the states. During post- Civil War Reconstruction , the Fourteenth Amendment

325-482: A concern since voting systems emerged in ancient times. The secret ballot is the simplest and most widespread measure to ensure that political views are not known to anyone other than the voters themselves—it is nearly universal in modern democracy and considered to be a basic right of citizenship . In fact, even where other rights of privacy do not exist, this type of privacy very often does. There are several forms of voting fraud or privacy violations possible with

390-553: A legal framework through the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), whose enforcement is assured through the European Court of Human Rights ' (ECtHR) jurisdiction. ECHR Article 10 on Freedom of expression says: " 1. Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. This article shall not prevent States from requiring

455-413: A longstanding tradition. In particular, courts look to whether the right is "so rooted in the traditions and conscience of our people as to be ranked as fundamental." Individual states may guarantee other rights as fundamental. That is, States may add to fundamental rights but can never diminish and rarely infringe upon fundamental rights by legislative processes. Any such attempt, if challenged, may involve

520-930: A mobility database. The study further shows that these constraints hold even when the resolution of the dataset is low. Therefore, even coarse or blurred datasets provide little anonymity. People may not wish for their medical records to be revealed to others due to the confidentiality and sensitivity of what the information could reveal about their health. For example, they might be concerned that it might affect their insurance coverage or employment. Or, it may be because they would not wish for others to know about any medical or psychological conditions or treatments that would bring embarrassment upon themselves. Revealing medical data could also reveal other details about one's personal life. There are three major categories of medical privacy: informational (the degree of control over personal information), physical (the degree of physical inaccessibility to others), and psychological (the extent to which

585-651: A person's accounts or credit card numbers, that person could become the victim of fraud or identity theft . Information about a person's purchases can reveal a great deal about that person's history, such as places they have visited, whom they have contact with, products they have used, their activities and habits, or medications they have used. In some cases, corporations may use this information to target individuals with marketing customized towards those individual's personal preferences, which that person may or may not approve. As heterogeneous information systems with differing privacy rules are interconnected and information

650-494: A picture with a store as a background. Caution should be exercised when posting information online. Social networks vary in what they allow users to make private and what remains publicly accessible. Without strong security settings in place and careful attention to what remains public, a person can be profiled by searching for and collecting disparate pieces of information, leading to cases of cyberstalking or reputation damage. Cookies are used on websites so that users may allow

715-581: A proposition for a Regulation to be known as the European Media Freedom Act (EMFA). Its aim is to safeguard against political interference and surveillance, ensure stable funding of public service media, transparency of media ownership and allocation of state advertising. The EU is seeking to enact tougher rules for media groups seeking to acquire smaller rivals, especially in light of concerns about media freedom in Poland, Hungary and Slovenia. The EU

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780-532: A result, Article 25 created a legal risk to organizations which transfer personal data from Europe to the United States. The program regulates the exchange of passenger name record information between the EU and the US. According to the EU directive, personal data may only be transferred to third countries if that country provides an adequate level of protection. Some exceptions to this rule are provided, for instance when

845-464: A way around these limitations without overturning the Slaughterhouse precedent: they created a concept called Selective Incorporation. Under this legal theory, the court used the remaining Fourteenth Amendment protections for equal protection and due process to "incorporate" individual elements of the Bill of Rights against the states . "The test usually articulated for determining fundamentality under

910-500: A wide range of opinions. The more pluralistic and articulated the opinions, the greater is the legitimising effect that media has on the wider democratic political process. Press freedom is often described as a watchdog over public power, underlining its significant role as an observer and informer of the public opinion on government actions. Freedom of expression refers back to individual journalists', as well as to press institutions' rights. In other words, its significance covers both

975-496: Is also concerned about the allocation of some countries' state advertising to pro-government outlets to influence the media. At the stage of proposition at the European Commission (prior to adoption as a legal act of the EU ), the draft has received a variety of reactions. The European Centre for Press and Media Freedom considers this proposition as a step in the right direction and has indicated that it intends to work with

1040-576: Is also known as the Copenhagen Dilemma , an issue addressed, among others, by the European Parliament resolution entitled EU Charter: standard settings for media freedom across the EU , adapted in May 2013. The document stresses the importance of monitoring and supervising the development of national legislations regarding media freedom in the EU member states and proposes to attribute this task to

1105-680: Is among the most sensitive data currently being collected. A list of potentially sensitive professional and personal information that could be inferred about an individual knowing only their mobility trace was published in 2009 by the Electronic Frontier Foundation . These include the movements of a competitor sales force, attendance of a particular church or an individual's presence in a motel, or at an abortion clinic. A recent MIT study by de Montjoye et al. showed that four spatio-temporal points, approximate places and times, are enough to uniquely identify 95% of 1.5 million people in

1170-555: Is applied as well to tabloid journalism . However, the more significant a specific journalistic item is to form public opinion, the higher priority needs to be given to press freedom when it is weighed up against other legitimate interests. The ruling of the ECtHR looks back at a long history of jurisprudence regarding violations of article 10, starting in the late 1970s. In particular, ECtHR protects investigative journalism , journalistic sources of information and whistle-blowers and stresses

1235-407: Is celebrated on 3 May. Media Freedom is inherent to the decision making process in a well-functioning democracy, enabling citizens to make their political choices based on independent and pluralistic information and thus is an important instrument to form public opinion . The expression of a variety of opinions is needed in public debate to give the citizens the possibility to assess and choose among

1300-730: Is controversial. Some websites may engage in deceptive practices such as placing cookie notices in places on the page that are not visible or only giving consumers notice that their information is being tracked but not allowing them to change their privacy settings. Apps like Instagram and Facebook collect user data for a personalized app experience; however, they track user activity on other apps, which jeopardizes users' privacy and data. By controlling how visible these cookie notices are, companies can discreetly collect data, giving them more power over consumers. As location tracking capabilities of mobile devices are advancing ( location-based services ), problems related to user privacy arise. Location data

1365-565: Is enforced by the Federal Trade Commission . U.S. organizations which register with this program, having self-assessed their compliance with a number of standards, are "deemed adequate" for the purposes of Article 25. Personal information can be sent to such organizations from the EEA without the sender being in breach of Article 25 or its EU national equivalents. The Safe Harbor was approved as providing adequate protection for personal data, for

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1430-482: Is important for Member States to ensure that users have easy and direct access at any time to information about media service providers. It is for each Member State to decide, in particular with respect to the information which may be provided on ownership structure and beneficial owners." This text was adopted by the European Parliament on 2 October 2018. On 16 September 2022, the European Commission adopted

1495-439: Is not the only internet content with privacy concerns. In an age where increasing amounts of information are online, social networking sites pose additional privacy challenges. People may be tagged in photos or have valuable information exposed about themselves either by choice or unexpectedly by others, referred to as participatory surveillance . Data about location can also be accidentally published, for example, when someone posts

1560-401: Is shared, policy appliances will be required to reconcile, enforce, and monitor an increasing amount of privacy policy rules (and laws). There are two categories of technology to address privacy protection in commercial IT systems: communication and enforcement. Computer privacy can be improved through individualization . Currently security messages are designed for the "average user", i.e.

1625-538: Is still held to the more exacting standard of strict scrutiny, instead of the less demanding rational basis test. During the Lochner era , the right to freedom of contract was considered fundamental, and thus restrictions on that right were subject to strict scrutiny . Following the 1937 Supreme Court decision in West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish , though, the right to contract became considerably less important in

1690-518: The 1974 Privacy Act . In February 2008, Jonathan Faull , the head of the EU's Commission of Home Affairs, complained about the US bilateral policy concerning PNR. The US had signed in February 2008 a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the Czech Republic in exchange of a visa waiver scheme, without concerting before with Brussels. The tensions between Washington and Brussels are mainly caused by

1755-637: The EU Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA). Regarding television services specifically, the Audiovisual Media Services Directive 2010 establishes that hate speech and speech harming minors must be prohibited in all member states. What is more, the Audiovisual Media Services Directive 2018 is set to instate the following position on media freedom: "In order to strengthen freedom of expression, and, by extension, to promote media pluralism and avoid conflicts of interest, it

1820-501: The Fair Information Practice Principles . But these have been critiqued for their insufficiency in the context of AI-enabled inferential information. On the internet many users give away a lot of information about themselves: unencrypted e-mails can be read by the administrators of an e-mail server if the connection is not encrypted (no HTTPS ), and also the internet service provider and other parties sniffing

1885-489: The Fifth Amendment 's requirement of indictment by grand jury . Many states choose to use preliminary hearings instead of grand juries. It is possible that future cases may incorporate additional clauses of the Bill of Rights against the states. The Bill of Rights lists specifically enumerated rights. The Supreme Court has extended fundamental rights by recognizing several fundamental rights not specifically enumerated in

1950-652: The Universal Declaration of Human Rights as well as Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights recognise freedom of expression and freedom of information as fundamental Human rights . Even though these documents are recognised universally, their enforcement depends widely on the state's will on adapting measures of implementation. On the European level, the Council of Europe provides

2015-437: The right to privacy , reputation or criminal justice . However, the restriction needs to be proportional to the achievement of the competing objective and press freedom and needs "very high requirements before any restrictions can be imposed on the freedom of the press by the public authorities." Even if Press freedom takes the function of a democracy guarantor, it does not only protect materials dealing with political issues, but

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2080-493: The Constitution, including but not limited to: Any restrictions a government statute or policy places on these rights are evaluated with strict scrutiny . If a right is denied to everyone, it is an issue of substantive due process . If a right is denied to some individuals but not others, it is also an issue of equal protection . However, any action that abridges a right deemed fundamental, when also violating equal protection,

2145-508: The Due Process Clause is that the putative right must be ' implicit in the concept of ordered liberty ', or ' deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition. '" Compare page 267 Lutz v. City of York, Pa., 899 F. 2d 255 - United States Court of Appeals, 3rd Circuit, 1990 . This set in motion a continuous process under which each individual right under the Bill of Rights was incorporated, one by one. That process has extended more than

2210-628: The EU Charter correspond to those given by the ECHR under article 10), which entered into force with the Lisbon Treaty in 2009 as Article 6(1) TEU . However, long before the entry into force of the treaty, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) recognised EU fundamental rights as general principles of EU law and considered them part of the legal framework on which it bases its jurisprudence. In practice,

2275-755: The European Parliament and the Council to bring further amendments to solve unaddressed issues. A very critical reaction to the proposed regulation has been seen in Hungary, where the EMFA has been labelled a threat to freedom of speech. There is a wide range of international governmental and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) that advocate for media freedom within the EU and the EU Candidate, Potential Candidate , as well as Eastern Partnership countries. The organisations' work includes theoretical activities such as producing reports on

2340-546: The European Union officially state that they are committed to upholding information privacy of individuals, but the former has caused friction between the two by failing to meet the standards of the EU's stricter laws on personal data. The negotiation of the Safe Harbor program was, in part, to address this long-running issue. Directive 95/46/EC declares in Chapter IV Article 25 that personal data may only be transferred from

2405-427: The ability to control what information one reveals about oneself over cable television, and who can access that information. For example, third parties can track IP TV programs someone has watched at any given time. "The addition of any information in a broadcasting stream is not required for an audience rating survey, additional devices are not requested to be installed in the houses of viewers or listeners, and without

2470-404: The classification of a right as "fundamental" invokes specific legal tests courts use to determine the constrained conditions under which the United States government and various state governments may limit these rights. In such legal contexts, courts determine whether rights are fundamental by examining the historical foundations of those rights and by determining whether their protection is part of

2535-529: The context of substantive due process and restrictions on it were evaluated under the rational basis standard. Data protection Information privacy is the relationship between the collection and dissemination of data , technology , the public expectation of privacy , contextual information norms , and the legal and political issues surrounding them. It is also known as data privacy or data protection . Various types of personal information often come under privacy concerns. This describes

2600-566: The controller themself can guarantee that the recipient will comply with the data protection rules. The European Commission has set up the "Working party on the Protection of Individuals with regard to the Processing of Personal Data," commonly known as the "Article 29 Working Party". The Working Party gives advice about the level of protection in the European Union and third countries. The Working Party negotiated with U.S. representatives about

2665-540: The countries in the European Economic Area to countries which provide adequate privacy protection. Historically, establishing adequacy required the creation of national laws broadly equivalent to those implemented by Directive 95/46/EU. Although there are exceptions to this blanket prohibition – for example where the disclosure to a country outside the EEA is made with the consent of the relevant individual (Article 26(1)(a)) – they are limited in practical scope. As

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2730-486: The data being anonymized by the government before being handed over. An example of a data request that Gove indicated had been rejected in the past, but might be possible under an improved version of privacy regulations, was for "analysis on sexual exploitation". Information about a person's financial transactions, including the amount of assets, positions held in stocks or funds, outstanding debts, and purchases can be sensitive. If criminals gain access to information such as

2795-519: The data. The ability to control the information one reveals about oneself over the internet and who can access that information has become a growing concern. These concerns include whether email can be stored or read by third parties without consent or whether third parties can continue to track the websites that someone visited. Another concern is whether websites one visits can collect, store, and possibly share personally identifiable information about users. The advent of various search engines and

2860-506: The different uses of their personally identifiable information. Data privacy issues may arise in response to information from a wide range of sources, such as: The United States Department of Commerce created the International Safe Harbor Privacy Principles certification program in response to the 1995 Directive on Data Protection (Directive 95/46/EC) of the European Commission. Both the United States and

2925-519: The dignity of patients, and to ensure that patients feel free to reveal complete and accurate information required for them to receive the correct treatment. To view the United States' laws on governing privacy of private health information, see HIPAA and the HITECH Act . The Australian law is the Privacy Act 1988 Australia as well as state-based health records legislation. Political privacy has been

2990-416: The doctor respects patients' cultural beliefs, inner thoughts, values, feelings, and religious practices and allows them to make personal decisions). Physicians and psychiatrists in many cultures and countries have standards for doctor–patient relationships , which include maintaining confidentiality. In some cases, the physician–patient privilege is legally protected. These practices are in place to protect

3055-534: The following: In Canada , the Charter of Rights and Freedoms outlines four Fundamental Freedoms. These are freedom of: On a European level, fundamental rights are protected in three laws: In Japan , fundamental rights protected by the Constitution of Japan include: There are six fundamental rights recognized in the Constitution of India: Though many fundamental rights are also widely considered human rights,

3120-468: The impact of fundamental EU laws and values on EU member states' behaviour is often limited. While indicating freedom of expression as a "key indicator of a country's readiness to become part of the EU", once a country has entered the Union, the EU institutions have a limited possibility to enforce the respect of fundamental rights and values, including those on freedom of expression and information. This phenomenon

3185-416: The individual right of each journalist to express his or her opinion and the press' right as an institution to inform people. To guarantee the protection of free media, state authorities not only underlie the negative obligation to abstain from intrusion, but as well to the positive commitment to promote media freedom and act as a guarantor against intrusion of public as well as private actors. Article 19 of

3250-421: The licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema enterprises. 2.The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society , in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for

3315-822: The necessity of their cooperations, audience ratings can be automatically performed in real-time." In the United Kingdom in 2012, the Education Secretary Michael Gove described the National Pupil Database as a "rich dataset" whose value could be "maximised" by making it more openly accessible, including to private companies. Kelly Fiveash of The Register said that this could mean "a child's school life including exam results, attendance, teacher assessments and even characteristics" could be available, with third-party organizations being responsible for anonymizing any publications themselves, rather than

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3380-450: The negative effect of sanctions against journalistic activities, as leading to auto-censorship and so hindering the purpose of journalism to inform people. On the other hand, the court has strengthened the protection of the right to privacy against reporting whose only purpose is to nourish people's curiosity. In the European Union, member states have committed to respect the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights (The rights under Article 11 of

3445-588: The network traffic of that connection are able to know the contents. The same applies to any kind of traffic generated on the Internet, including web browsing , instant messaging , and others. In order not to give away too much personal information, e-mails can be encrypted and browsing of webpages as well as other online activities can be done traceless via anonymizers , or by open source distributed anonymizers, so-called mix networks . Well-known open-source mix nets include I2P – The Anonymous Network and Tor . Email

3510-488: The press , is the principal platform for ensuring freedom of expression and freedom of information , referring to the right to express value judgments and the right of allegation of facts, respectively. While the term media freedom refers to the absence of state monopoly or excessive state intrusion, Media pluralism is understood in terms of lack of private control over media, meaning the avoidance of concentrated private media ownership. The annual World Press Freedom Day

3575-457: The privacy and confidentiality of human subjects in research. Privacy concerns exist wherever personally identifiable information or other sensitive information is collected, stored, used, and finally destroyed or deleted – in digital form or otherwise. Improper or non-existent disclosure control can be the root cause for privacy issues. Informed consent mechanisms including dynamic consent are important in communicating to data subjects

3640-511: The protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary." As observable in the citation, within the ECHR freedom of expression is not recognised as an absolute right, meaning it can be restricted if there are other competing fundamental rights or legitimate objectives necessary for democratic society. These might be data protection ,

3705-530: The protection of personal data, the Safe Harbor Principles were the result. Notwithstanding that approval, the self-assessment approach of the Safe Harbor remains controversial with a number of European privacy regulators and commentators. The Safe Harbor program addresses this issue in the following way: rather than a blanket law imposed on all organizations in the United States , a voluntary program

3770-561: The purposes of Article 25(6), by the European Commission on 26 July 2000. Under the Safe Harbor, adoptee organizations need to carefully consider their compliance with the onward transfer obligations , where personal data originating in the EU is transferred to the US Safe Harbor, and then onward to a third country. The alternative compliance approach of " binding corporate rules ", recommended by many EU privacy regulators, resolves this issue. In addition, any dispute arising in relation to

3835-550: The same message for everyone. Researchers have posited that individualized messages and security "nudges", crafted based on users' individual differences and personality traits, can be used for further improvements for each person's compliance with computer security and privacy. Improve privacy through data encryption By converting data into a non-readable format, encryption prevents unauthorized access. At present, common encryption technologies include AES and RSA. Use data encryption so that only users with decryption keys can access

3900-558: The state of media freedom in different countries, as well as giving practical help, such as financial or legal support, to people active in journalism. Fundamental rights Some universally recognised rights that are seen as fundamental, i.e., contained in the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights , the U.N. International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights , or the U.N. International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights , include

3965-629: The transfer of HR data to the US Safe Harbor must be heard by a panel of EU privacy regulators. In July 2007, a new, controversial, Passenger Name Record agreement between the US and the EU was made. A short time afterwards, the Bush administration gave exemption for the Department of Homeland Security , for the Arrival and Departure Information System (ADIS) and for the Automated Target System from

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4030-469: The use of data mining created a capability for data about individuals to be collected and combined from a wide variety of sources very easily. AI facilitated creating inferential information about individuals and groups based on such enormous amounts of collected data, transforming the information economy. The FTC has provided a set of guidelines that represent widely accepted concepts concerning fair information practices in an electronic marketplace, called

4095-519: The use of digital voting machines. The legal protection of the right to privacy in general – and of data privacy in particular – varies greatly around the world. Laws and regulations related to Privacy and Data Protection are constantly changing, it is seen as important to keep abreast of any changes in the law and to continually reassess compliance with data privacy and security regulations. Within academia, Institutional Review Boards function to assure that adequate measures are taken to ensure both

4160-561: The website to retrieve some information from the user's internet, but they usually do not mention what the data being retrieved is. In 2018, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) passed a regulation that forces websites to visibly disclose to consumers their information privacy practices, referred to as cookie notices. This was issued to give consumers the choice of what information about their behavior they consent to letting websites track; however, its effectiveness

4225-602: Was adopted in 1868 to rectify this condition, and to specifically apply the whole of the Constitution to all U.S. states. In 1873, the Supreme Court essentially nullified the key language of the Fourteenth Amendment that guaranteed all " privileges or immunities " to all U.S. citizens, in a series of cases called the Slaughterhouse cases . This decision and others allowed post-emancipation racial discrimination to continue largely unabated. Later Supreme Court justices found

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