Privacy to Get Attention of Congress

Two years ago, the Republican Congress quietly passed a law mandating that states use Social Security numbers on driver’s licenses, hoping to make it harder for illegal immigrants to get jobs.

Before the election, another Republican Congress froze funding to carry out that law--a step toward creating a national identification card, critics said--blaming the Clinton administration for trampling on personal privacy even though Republicans had introduced the legislation.

That is but one example of a broad and growing backlash over the loss of personal privacy. Official Washington is quickly becoming leery of technocratic data-management ideas, from the driver’s license law to new uses for government databases to an “individual health identifier” for patients’ medical records.

“The United States is an underdeveloped country when it comes to privacy protection,” said Sanford Sherizen, a criminologist in Massachusetts who specializes in information security.

Privacy issues are expected to get much more attention when Congress formally reconvenes next year. An amalgam of activists on both the left and right, ranging from the American Civil Liberties Union to Phyllis Schlafly’s Eagle Forum, have indicated that they will be working hard to draw a line against government intrusiveness.

“In the next Congress, the shift will be more pronounced, with the rollback of some of these anti-privacy proposals as . . . consumers demand the right to take back and control personal data,” said ACLU lawyer Gregory T. Nojeim.

At minimum, the activists want to repeal the driver’s license requirement and the health identifier, which are still part of federal law. But some also are talking about sweeping legislation to enhance personal privacy.

Whether privacy safeguards can be more than a quaint anachronism in the age of Internet transparency--when everything from Social Security numbers to intimate photos can be but a few clicks away--is an open question.

“Identities are not so much being stolen as scooped up,” Sherizen said. “We worry about Big Brother, but what we have to worry about is Big Browser.”

Yet information technology does not have to be a one-way street. It can be used to enhance privacy as well as erode it, he said. But Americans have rushed into the Information Age without fully considering its consequences.

“For those of us who believe in a balance between the government and the people, the time has come to look at this comprehensively,” said conservative Rep. Bob Barr (R-Ga.). “There hasn’t been comprehensive legislation, but all the things that have been happening point to the need for it.”

Privacy issues seem to appeal equally to conservatives and liberals. Both are wary of the reach of government. Joining them are consumer groups who believe that government is not doing enough to protect the massive amounts of personal information in its records.

And there is no anti-privacy lobby. Instead, backers of measures that have run afoul of privacy activists uniformly claim to be trying to do social good.

For example, the national health identifier could facilitate everything from cancer research to first aid for someone who passes out on the street. And the driver’s license requirement, the target of a grass-roots protest by Christian fundamentalists using the Internet, was intended to help enforce laws that cracked down on workers who had entered the country illegally.

“Anyone can buy the appearance of citizenship for $20-$30 on the streets of Los Angeles by purchasing a fraudulent Social Security card and birth certificate,” complained Rep. Lamar S. Smith (R-Texas), who helped write the driver’s license law and is committed to preserving it.

But many conservatives who share Smith’s views on illegal immigrants do not agree on this issue. Sheila Moloney, executive director of the Eagle Forum, said that “we empathize with Lamar on immigration.” But, she said, the forum is part of “a bizarre coalition” with “good friends” at the ACLU.

Among the issues likely to make privacy a topic of keen interest next year:

* The campaign to repeal the driver’s license and health identifier measures will provide a focus for privacy activists. (The funding freeze enacted this year ends in September.) Repeal of the measures likely would be part of any comprehensive privacy legislation.

* New efforts to safeguard the privacy of Internet users are expected. This year, Congress and the administration took a step in that direction by prohibiting the collection of information from children using the Internet unless their parents had given permission. But major controversies remain about technology that collects information on the habits of people who visit a website. Some favor restrictions on data collection. Others support disclosure to the consumer.

* Congress and the administration will have to deal with a tough privacy law adopted by the 15-nation European Union. The Commerce Department is concerned that the law would restrict trade with Europe. It bars European companies from buying and selling personal data--including information collected in normal business transactions, such as credit card purchases--and from transmitting information about individuals to firms in countries that lack similar privacy laws.

* The White House has named Vice President Al Gore to coordinate administration policy on privacy issues. Gore, a high-tech enthusiast who is widely expected to run for president in 2000, could be politically vulnerable to public reaction against technological intrusion.

Privacy advocates suffered one major defeat this year. A measure to expand the FBI’s eavesdropping powers by allowing “roving wiretaps” of individuals instead of confining them to specific phone lines became law after it was slipped into a national security bill just before it was passed.

“Unfortunately, my own party allowed that to happen,” Barr said.

But there were also some victories too. A proposal to create a national database on voters went nowhere. And a plan to use a government database on new hires to track student loan deadbeats was voted down.

The driver’s license battle this year provided a dramatic illustration of the breadth of concerns about privacy. State legislators, the ACLU, conservative groups, Latino organizations and consumers joined forces to oppose it.

The measure was passed as part of a 1996 immigration bill. Beginning Oct. 1, 2000, it would prohibit federal agencies from accepting a state driver’s license as identification unless the state put Social Security numbers on its licenses or verified those of license applicants.

Texas congressman Smith said that it was meant not to presage a national ID card but to stop trade in phony driver’s licenses that facilitate illegal immigration.

“There are people with genuine concerns about privacy” who oppose the measure, he said, “but there are also fringe groups who believe the United Nations is taking over Yellowstone National Park . . . or that [people] have been abducted by UFOs.”

The National Conference of State Legislatures--a primary opponent of the license requirement--hardly qualifies as a fringe group.

Sheri Steisel, a senior policy expert for the state group, said the requirement would come at a time when most states are backing away from using Social Security numbers because of public concerns about identity theft.

Only six states and the District of Columbia require the use of Social Security numbers on driver’s licenses. California does not.

“This is a state document that the federal government has no business trying to regulate,” said Steisel. “They attempted to create a national ID card during the immigration debate and when they couldn’t do it, this was the fallback.”

In addition to concern about interference from Washington, Steisel said that states are worried about abetting fraud. Stolen Social Security numbers can be used to obtain credit, transfer funds in a bank account and gain access to all manner of personal records.

“The intention was to stop a small number of people from working illegally,” Steisel said, “but this puts the majority of folks at risk for consumer fraud.”

Latino organizations oppose the license requirement because they fear that it would lead to police harassment of Americans of Latino descent.

“It used to be common for Mexican Americans to have to prove that they belonged in their own country,” said Cecilia Munoz, spokeswoman for the National Council of La Raza. “Never again will we allow our community to be put in that position.”

The most unexpected, and effective, opposition has come from Scott McDonald, a home builder from Gurley, Ala. A religious conservative, McDonald maintains an Internet site on privacy issues (www.networkusa.org). After he wrote about the driver’s license issue on his site, the Transportation Department began receiving hundreds of critical letters.

McDonald himself sent a 14-page letter detailing his Bible-based objections. “It’s contrary to my religious beliefs,” he said in an interview. “A Christian should not be identified using numbers.”

Washington-based privacy consultant Robert Gellman said that the nearly 2,500 letters generated by McDonald’s campaign had an effect.

“It was very striking--this is something that hadn’t happened before,” Gellman said.