I am a privacy activist who has been riding a variety of high horses about the dangers of permanent, ubiquitous data collection since 2012. I believe the major players in the online tracking space should team up with the CDC, FEMA, or some other Federal agency that has a narrow remit around public health, and build a national tracking database that will operate for some fixed amount of time, with the sole purpose of containing the coronavirus epidemic. It will be necessary to pass legislation to loosen medical privacy laws and indemnify participating companies from privacy lawsuits, as well as override California’s privacy law, to collect this data. I don’t believe the legal obstacles are insuperable, but I welcome correction on this point by people who know the relevant law.

this guy is super super tedious, but he raises valid questions this time.

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