Sweet
Briar College Libraries prohibit the release of Library records
and/or the disclosure of patron information. Library staff, faculty,
student employees and/or volunteers can not tell anyone, including
Sweet Briar College faculty, what materials are, or have been, checked
out to any individual. Likewise, no personal information about patrons
of the Sweet Briar College Libraries may be released by Library
staff, faculty, student employees and/or volunteers. Sweet Briar
College Libraries are committed to protecting our patron's rights
to privacy.
"In a library
(physical or virtual), the right to privacy is the right to open
inquiry without having the subject of one's interest examined or
scrutinized by others. Confidentiality exists when a library is
in possession of personally identifiable information about users
and keeps that information private on their behalf" (Privacy:
An Interpretation of the Library Bill of Rights).
The
ethical responsibilities of librarians, as well as statutes in most
states and the District of Columbia, protect the privacy of library
users. Confidentiality extends to "information sought or received
and resources consulted, borrowed, acquired or transmitted"
(ALA Code of Ethics), and includes, but is not limited to, database
search records, reference interviews, circulation records, interlibrary
loan records and other personally identifiable uses of library materials,
facilities, or services.
The First Amendment's
guarantee of freedom of speech and of the press requires that the
corresponding rights to hear what is spoken and read what is written
be preserved, free from fear of government intrusion, intimidation,
or reprisal. The Sweet Briar College Libraries reaffirms its opposition
to "any use of governmental prerogatives that lead to the intimidation
of individuals or groups and discourages them from exercising the
right of free expression as guaranteed by the First Amendment to
the U.S. Constitution" and "encourages resistance to such
abuse of governmental power . . ." (ALA Policy 53.4). In seeking
access or in the pursuit of information, confidentiality is the
primary means of providing the privacy that will free the individual
from fear of intimidation or retaliation.
The Sweet Briar
College Libraries regularly receives reports of visits by agents
of federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies to libraries,
asking for personally identifiable information about library users.
These visits, whether under the rubric of simply informing libraries
of agency concerns or for some other reason, reflect an insensitivity
to the legal and ethical bases for confidentiality, and the role
it plays in the preservation of First Amendment rights, rights also
extended to foreign nationals while in the United States. The government's
interest in library use reflects a dangerous and fallacious equation
of what a person reads with what that person believes or how that
person is likely to behave. Such a presumption can and does threaten
the freedom of access to information. It also is a threat to a crucial
aspect of First Amendment rights: that freedom of speech and of
the press include the freedom to hold, disseminate and receive unpopular,
minority, extreme, or even dangerous ideas.
The Sweet Briar
College Libraries recognizes that law enforcement agencies and officers
may occasionally believe that library records contain information
that would be helpful to the investigation of criminal activity.
The American judicial system provides the mechanism for seeking
release of such confidential records: a court order, following a
showing of good cause based on specific facts, by a court of competent
jurisdiction.1
The Sweet Briar
College Libraries also recognizes that, under limited circumstances,
access to certain information might be restricted due to a legitimate
national security concern. However, there has been no showing of
a plausible probability that national security will be compromised
by any use made of unclassified information available in libraries.
Access to this unclassified information should be handled no differently
than access to any other information. Therefore, libraries and librarians
have a legal and ethical responsibility to protect the confidentiality
of all library users, including foreign nationals.
Libraries are
one of the great bulwarks of democracy. They are living embodiments
of the First Amendment because their collections include voices
of dissent as well as assent. Libraries are impartial resources
providing information on all points of view, available to all persons
regardless of origin, age, background, or views. The role of libraries
as such a resource must not be compromised by an erosion of the
privacy rights of library users.
Adapted
from the ALA
Policy concerning Confidentiality of Personally Identifiable Information
about Library Users, Adopted July 2, 1991; amended June 30,
2004, by the ALA Council
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