Ann E. Marimow , The New York Times; Supreme Court Weighs Privacy Law From the Videotape Era of ‘Be Kind, Rewind’
The justices will consider how the Video Privacy Protection Act of 1988 applies in the digital age of streaming videos, email newsletters and targeted advertisements.
"When the Senate considered President Ronald Reagan’s nomination of Robert H. Bork for a Supreme Court vacancy in 1987, a journalist in Washington obtained and published a list of nearly 150 movies the federal judge and his family had rented from a local video store.
Judge Bork’s nomination was scuttled by the Senate for reasons unrelated to his family’s decision to rent “The Shining” and “Sixteen Candles.” But lawmakers were so upset about the “Bork Tapes” becoming public that they passed legislation the following year to prohibit video stores from disclosing the private information of customers.
Forty years later, the Supreme Court on Wednesday will examine how that privacy law, adopted in the VHS era, applies in the age of streaming, email newsletters and targeted online advertisements.
At the heart of the case is the question of who can sue under the Video Privacy Protection Act, or what it means to be a consumer whose privacy interests are protected by the law. The issue has divided lower courts and has implications for a broad swath of Americans and companies doing business online."
