> I think it's total BS to think that "users don't have an expectation of privacy" when a company offers a service to hold and process their data
I sometimes wonder if companies put exactly this wording into their privacy policies if it would make a difference legally. Right now they put all kinds of other verbiage which allows law enforcement to argue around it. But what if companies simply wrote into their privacy policy:
By storing your data with us you can reasonably expect that your data will be kept private from access by any other person
Now how can law enforcement argue that someone accessing the service didn't have a reasonable expectation of privacy?
Of course, a company's lawyers might say that this is something they can't actually deliver given the government can demand to access their information. But it's exactly in this way that it's a self-fulfilling prophecy: it is exactly by giving this guarantee to their users that they create the legal argument they need to be able to deliver it. And it is exactly by not giving this guarantee to their users that they deprive themselves of the legal power to achieve it.
I sometimes wonder if companies put exactly this wording into their privacy policies if it would make a difference legally. Right now they put all kinds of other verbiage which allows law enforcement to argue around it. But what if companies simply wrote into their privacy policy:
By storing your data with us you can reasonably expect that your data will be kept private from access by any other person
Now how can law enforcement argue that someone accessing the service didn't have a reasonable expectation of privacy?
Of course, a company's lawyers might say that this is something they can't actually deliver given the government can demand to access their information. But it's exactly in this way that it's a self-fulfilling prophecy: it is exactly by giving this guarantee to their users that they create the legal argument they need to be able to deliver it. And it is exactly by not giving this guarantee to their users that they deprive themselves of the legal power to achieve it.