This report is a legal analysis of PHRs and what privacy issues are at stake in PHRs, especially PHRs that exist outside of HIPAA, the federal privacy rule.

The HIPAA privacy rule provides a degree of privacy protection for covered health records. The rule has problems and gaps, but it does establish minimum national privacy standards for disclosure, access, correction, and other elements of fair information practices. State laws that provide additional privacy protections remain in effect and can provide additional legal protections for privacy.

Under HIPAA, if a consumer wants to authorize a covered entity to disclose her records, she will usually be obliged to sign an authorization form. The HIPAA rule prescribes the content of the authorization form and its scope. That rule provides some protections because it makes it harder for a consumer to unknowingly sign a form authorizing the disclosure of health records. For example, if a consumer signs a one-sentence form authorizing anyone with records about the consumer to disclose the records to the bearer of the form, it is unlikely that any doctor or hospital would or should honor that form.

Security Freeze update | Financial privacy — As of November 1, 2007, the ability to place a security freeze is available nationwide at the three major credit reporting bureaus. To date, 39 states and the District of Columbia have some form of security freeze law. But now, even in the states that did not pass security freeze legislation, consumers will be able to place a security freeze. A security freeze lets you stop the disclosure of your credit report by a credit bureau. A security freeze can be especially helpful to individuals who are having persistent problems with identity theft. For more information:

Roadmap: The National Advertising Initiative – Failing at Consumer Protection and at Self-Regulation: Difficulties with the NAI

When people sit at their computers and browse for new car information or to learn about the latest treatment for diabetes, when people walk down the street reading stock quotes on their mobile phones, and when people text a response for more information based on a television commercial they saw, their actions speak louder than words. A new realm of consumer tracking has grown up to translate these activities into advertisements. This kind of advertising is behaviorally targeted advertising. Behaviorally targeted advertising is as controversial as it is lucrative.