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Samir Chopra at The Nation proposes that we treat algorithms as agents of the companies that deploy them. In effect, treat computer programs as people, too.
From the article:
I suggest we fit artificial agents like smart programs into a specific area of law, one a little different from that which makes corporations people, but in a similar spirit of rational regulation. We should consider programs to be legal agents--capable of information and knowledge acquisition like humans--of their corporate or governmental principals. The Google defense--your privacy was not violated because humans didn't read your e-mail--would be especially untenable if Google's and NSA's programs were regarded as their legal agents: by agency law and its central doctrine of respondeat superior (let the master answer), their agents' activities and knowledge would become those of their legal principal, and could not be disowned; the artificial automation shield between the government (the principal) and the agent (the program) would be removed.
If such a position were adopted, there could be a significant impact on the permissibility of scanning of emails for targeted advertisements or on ISP's ability to perform deep packet inspection.
(Score: 1) by dw861 on Friday June 06 2014, @06:57PM
I can understand why Oligonicella balked at my suggestion, but RaffArundel has it entirely correct.
We can give even more context for the jurisdiction about which I am more familiar: Canada.
The Hudson's Bay Company was chartered in 1670 as the oldest incorporated joint-stock merchandising company in the English-speaking world. For almost all of the area in which it had a monopoly, it preceded what most of us would recognize as modern functioning governments. For most of Canada, the company was both government and the law.
http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/hudsons-bay-company/ [thecanadianencyclopedia.ca]
Regarding the status of women under the law in Canada. The British North America Act of 1867 did not recognize women as legal 'persons'. Because women did not have the status of 'persons' under the law, women were eligible for pains and penalties, but not rights and privileges.
The Supreme Court of Canada ruled that women did not have the legal status of personhood in 1928. This was overturned one year later by the Judicial Council of Britain's Privy Council. This significant legal event, known as "The Person's Case" is commemorated on the back of the Canadian $50 bill.
http://thecanadianencyclopedia.com/en/article/famous-5/ [thecanadianencyclopedia.com]
1929 was not very long ago. Back to the original post that spawned this sub-thread. I hope that sometime in the future, people will be similarly amazed that in our present, bots, programs, etc, were used as proxies for organizations with legal status to avoid punishment for violating rights to privacy.
(Score: 2) by Oligonicella on Monday June 09 2014, @02:51PM
By 1867 women could not be bought and sold. They could not be disassembled and the parts fobbed off. They were not the target hostile takeovers. Corporations could, with legal impunity.
I can dredge up as many differences in favor of women (most holding a higher ethical stand, I believe) as you can in favor of corporations. The original point was that corporations were considered *more* persons and I still say bollocks.