Information, Freedom and Property

This book addresses issues on the nexus of freedom of and property in information, while acknowledging that both hiding and exposing information may affect our privacy. It inquires into the physics, the technologies, the business models, the governmental strategies and last but not least the legal frameworks concerning access, organisation and control of information. It debates whether it is in the very nature of information to be either free or monopolized, or both. Analysing upcoming power structures, new types of colonization and attempts to replace legal norms with techno-nudging, this book also presents the idea of an infra-ethics capable of pre-empting our pre-emption. It discusses the interrelations between open access, the hacker ethos, the personal data economy, and freedom of information, highlighting the ephemeral but pivotal role played by information in a data-driven society. This book is a must-read for those working on the contemporary dimensions of freedom of information, data protection, and intellectual property rights.

Mireille Hildebrandt is a tenured Research Professor of 'Interfacing Law and Technology' at the Faculty of Law and Criminology at Vrije Universiteit Brussel. She also holds the parttime Chair of Smart Environments, Data Protection and the Rule of Law at the Science Faculty of Radboud University.

Bibi van den Berg is an associate professor and research director at eLaw, the Center for Law and Digital Technologies at the Law School of Leiden University, the Netherlands.