Let us agree up front that we (society) suck at all three.
Now, what do we do about it?
Identity is mostly about accountability and a little bit about trust and non-repudiation. Accountability for what you do is a foundation of a civil society, and without it we don’t really function very well. Knowing who you are dealing with is important; it establishes what you will and will not do or say, it establishes who to appeal to when things don’t go the way you want them to, and it allows you to defend yourself when you are threatened. And that works both ways – when you are the one in the wrong and when you are the one being wronged. In other words, being able to assign a unique label to those we interact with is pretty vital, so vital in fact, that we basically don’t know how to function in a world without identity, so when we want to be hidden, rather than going without an identity, we have to contrive an alternate identity.
Privacy is mostly about embarrassment and harassment and a little bit about anonymity and “none of your business”. We do things we don’t want to remember. We do things we don’t want to be remembered by others. We do things that we don’t want others to know about. It is easy to lump all these things into a “nefarious actions” container and proclaim that “sunlight is the best disinfectant” but that misses an important point; there are things about others we don’t want to know. Not only do we have things we’d rather not share, we want others to not share their similar bits of information. Mystery makes for good neighbors. Thus privacy is really about equitable disclosure – when you over-share or snoop you aren’t being a good member of society; both are equally offensive. What is or is not “your business” is a direct function of what you have done in the past to establish trustworthiness and accountability in a relationship.
Technology is just the ability to build and use tools; in this context we’ll be talking about the use of technology to enhance or degrade identity and privacy. Specifically, we’re talking about how to use technology to establish and maintain boundaries in relationships between (relatively powerless) individuals and (relatively powerful) corporations and governments.
Why is it necessary for an individual to bear the burden of self-defense against an enterprise? Because enterprises can’t be hurt by an individual where as an individual can be destroyed (physically, in the case of a state) by an enterprise. Corporations aren’t people and they don’t follow the same rules of moral sentiment that people do. In fact, the concept of legal person applied to a for-profit corporation makes corporations psychopaths. Governments aren’t people and they don’t follow the same rules of moral sentiment that people do, but in different ways than corporations. In fact, the State’s monopolies on killing and coinage makes the State a brute. Consequently, the individual is at a disadvantage both in the market and under the law; technology is an agnostic resource that can be used as force amplifier for the individual to attempt to balance the scales when it comes to their relationship with enterprises.