Book Review: The Ultimate Privacy Field Guide: A Workbook of Best Practices

Abstract

Privacy, a concept that provides individuals with the right to control how their personal information is used, is one of the core values of librarianship. This is so because the practice of librarianship is a patron-driven discipline closely allied with modern democratic values such as freedom of access to information as well as freedom from external powers—governmental, corporate, administrative, or what have you—attempting to limit such freedom of access. Privacy is also a core value of librarianship because librarianship in our time is one of a larger set of disciplines associated with information management and digital security. As librarians, we are entrusted with the privacy and confidentiality of our patrons’ and staff’s information and our patrons and staff, in turn, have a right to expect us to protect that information. Furthermore, in addition to keeping information private, librarians should also be able to explain which information should be kept private and also why any specific pieces of information fall under privacy constraints, if for no other reason than in order to justify the high estimation librarians have of privacy.