Should companies have privacy rights? With recent legal rulings suggesting that companies have similar legal rights to individuals, does that include privacy rights? A bunch of groups, including Public Citizen and the EFF, have filed an amicus brief in a case that looks into that question. The lawsuit is between the FCC and AT&T. It seems that the FCC had done an investigation where it determined that AT&T — the same company that has “helped out” the government by explaining how the feds could get around pesky oversight rules by using post-it notes — has been over-billing the government.
That seems like pretty interesting information, and some others thought so — which is why a Freedom of Information Act request was made to the FCC, and the FCC agreed to hand over the documents concerning the investigation. AT&T, in response, sued the FCC, saying that releasing this info would violate the company’s “personal privacy.” Huh? It’s hard to see how a company has “personal privacy.” You can understand not releasing confidential information that involves a trade secret, or other such information. But claiming that details of an investigation of how you may have bilked the government is “private” info seems a bit absurd. If that was the case, then any company could demand that any embarrassing information never be released.
Unfortunately, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with AT&T, suggesting that the exemption in the Freedom of Information Act for “personal privacy” does, in fact, apply to AT&T as well. The new brief urges the Supreme Court review the case:
Unless the Supreme Court takes the case and reverses the Third Circuit decision, records about safety violations at a coal mine, environmental problems at an offshore oil rig, filthy conditions at a food manufacturing plant, financial shenanigans at an investment bank and many other records like these may be the subject of so-called corporate privacy claims that could result in agencies withholding those records from the public under FOIA.
Permalink | Comments | Email This Story
