Detraction of Privacy in the Information Society (Beeintrachtigung Der Privatsphare in Der Informationsgesellschaft)

Digitizing, Minimizing and Networking are the prerequisites for the evolving Information-Society, whose most attracting features are gathering, storing, linking and providing of enormous amounts of data. Best-known advantages are easy communication via e-Mail, easy access to information via Internet, comfortable services in e-Commerce and e-Government. On the other hand there are substantial dangers for privacy coming along with these developments. This paper shows basic technological developments, different actors and their use of personal data and deals with short and long-term effects of detraction of privacy. Special emphasis is given to the analysis of existing trade-offs between efficiency and security on the one hand and privacy on the other. Based on existing privacy regulations some recommendations for further policy actions are given