Do you lose the right to privacy when you die?

pumped for these two subjects today. Yeah, mainly I'm pumped about putting out a decent episode for once once in your life. I hope we do. I probably just chink this, so I'm gonna overthink it. No, no, no, no, this is great. It's gold. Here we go there, Chuck. Yes, have you ever heard of something called death Switch? Is it a movie? Nope? Was it a band? No? Should be? I think kill switch is a band, uh and a thing,

maybe even a fail safe um. But death switch is a service, an Internet service that you or I or any schmo with even a dial up connection can go uh get Okay. There's a free version of it where you can insert one email address in one message, and then there's a premium version where you can do up to thirty email addresses and all this other stuff. But the point of it is this, you set up all the stuff you want to say to people after you're dead.

Whether it's like, you know, see you in hell or heaven? Yeah, well yeah, I guess it depends on your disposition or your bent um or you know, I love you, just wanted to tell you one last time, or freaking you out right that think, yeah, this is I know what you did that kind of thing. Um. And you know, with the premium service you can attach things like movies and things like that, so you can be like, hey,

here's one last bootleg. I know you always like my pirated movies, so here's one more, you know, but like right, and you would have it sit to me every day for the next years. Right, Well, I think it just goes out once. But um, the point is you you you create all these emails and then Death's which sits on them for you secured like they're secured, and then um, on a fixed schedule, they send you an email saying, hey, click this link and put in your password, like basically,

are you still alive? Exactly UM, And if you don't answer, it does it again and again and again, and then you know, there's a set amount of times where it starts to really kind of pepper you, like, hey man, we're about to like, you know, the big yeah that that your boss is gonna get that email if you don't do this, And then it goes, Okay, you're dead. You're either dead or you're in a coma, or you're

just you're critically incapacitated, can't even ask for a computer. Um, And here you go and it sends out your emails for you, which is pretty cool. And I think it's cool that everyone, anyone gets one free message from this company. You can do one email, one email address, with one message, no attachments or whatever, for free at death switch dot com, which which I owe no shares for a stake or any kind of financial interest, hope not. How much is

the premium service? I don't know what am I like? Your am I? Your Google? You know, let me google that for you. So the point is, um, death switch is kind of the service that straddles the line of what we're talking about today, which is privacy after death, because they maintain your privacy while you're still alive, and then after you're dead, the whole point is to go blab whatever you want to blab right for the very

least after you don't return their email. But the presence of death switch and the whole service that provides actually falls squarely on one side of Um. What's kind of a pretty big, uh moral philosophical, ethical discussion I'm finding after researching this, and that is whether or not you do have any right to privacy after you're debt um? And I thought this was a pretty good this is it was the grabster who wrote this article, so of course it's quality. He should get paid extra for this. Yeah,

we should at least get to meet him. Yeah. Now I emailed him a while back and was I mean early on it was like, hey, that's right, he leave me alone. Who are you pod? What? Yeah? Um, so the grabster wrote this article, you know it's quality. Um and uh. He makes a really good point right out of the gate, like to understand whether or not we have any privacy right after we're dead, Let's first investigate the privacy rights we have when we're alive. Good way to go about it. And they are both at once

sweeping and attenuous. That's a good way to put it. Thanks. Well, Uh, the Constitution, if you're going to talk rights of American citizens at least no better place to start. Yeah, because it says in the Constitution everyone has the right to privacy. No, it does not, doesn't say that in that document or the Bill of Rights. But the Supreme Court over the years has interpreted the Constitution in such a way that it in many cases does provide a right to privacy,

based on largely Ninth Amendment, which is good. Ninth Amendment says that there's probably rights that the framers didn't think of. Yeah, pretty broad. Yeah. Fourth Amendment of course, unlawful search and seizure my favorite, And the fourteenth Amendment, which is that the Feds can't deprive you of life or liberty or property, buddy, right, And in the interpretation of liberty, privacy is a major aspect of that. Sure. So this has played out, um,

several times. Anything that's not in the Constitution that can be challenged means it's up to the Supreme Court to decide what's what, and they have uh, generally sided with the rights of the individual to privacy time and time again. Um, the government has had the back of its hands smacked when it's tried to say, hey, parents, you have to do this with your kids education. You can't homeschool them, hippie, you need to put them in public schools so we

can teach them exactly what we want. In the Supreme Court side, no no no. Uh. They also um said, by the way, you also can't outlaw sodomy between two consenting adults. Um. Do you remember that time when there was like like sodomy was illegal. Yeah, we were alive and sentient. Yeah, Griswold, I'm sorry. Uh. Lawrence v. Texas two thousand three, Yes, I know, that's pretty recent. That was John Lawrence and Tyrone Gardner were lovers, lovers boyfriend, boyfriend,

boyfriend and boyfriend. They were committing an active coitus love making in the privacy of their own home in the bedroom even and it was consentual. It's a big one too, very much consensual and uh in a sheriff's deputy uh entered the apartment with his weapon drawn because a call had been made by their neighbor saying that there was someone waving a gun and there was domestic dispute going on.

So the sheriff goes in there see these two guys doing it, and they're like, you're under arrest for doing that. And as it comes out later the neighbor he's like, do you see this phallic symbol holding in my hand? It turns out the name where that had reported this, uh was previously in a relationship with one of those dudes. It was a false uh false not charge, but what do you call it? A false report? And he was convicted of fifteen days in jail for making that call.

Can you believe petty jealousy ended up changing the law under the Supreme plan? That is crazy, But they basically went to the Supreme Court and in a six three ruling they said, you know what, dudes, you can do that deed in your bedroom there. Good for you, Chuck, good for Texas, Good for Texas, good for the gay community as well. Sure there's this great Um, did you ever read any Akbar and Jeff comics Matt Greening stuff from like Life as Hell? Uh, a New Life as Hell?

I've never heard of the other? Was that part of that part of his to the two guys who looked like twins who both wore feathers, Oh yeah, Yeah, there was one where it was like they were both sitting on the couch together and it said like that they were watching the news and it said like from the TV, uh, the sodomy has been outlawed, and like they move apart on the couch and then they moved back together and

they go, damn the law. The first case you mentioned, though, wash was Meyer versus Nebraska, and that was in nineteen twenty. A teacher was teaching German to a student and they busted him and arrested him. They're like, you're not teaching anyone German. You need to be teaching them freedom language exactly a k a American. But he won. And then in Connecticut, UH, two people, UH Planned Parenthood director and a physician opened a birth control clinic and they were

arrested for selling contraceptives. But that was overturned, right, so they're siding with the people. So those are those are cases of privacy, you know, basically based on what you do in in your own home or what you do in your own educational system. UM business not so much because you can't you know, you can't refuse the right. You can't refuse service to somebody based on like their skin color anything. Yeah, but you can sell contraceptives minute,

you totally can. You can sell contraceptives to anybody you want. Um. But there's there's those are those are all based on the idea that it's what you're doing in your own home, it's your own private business, that kind of thing, right. Um, But there's actually an act. There's a federal act that says you have privacy, especially when it comes to government agencies.

And that's the Federal Privacy Act, appropriately named of nineteen seventy four that came about at the time when people were just starting to figure out what computers are capable of. They're like, wow, those punch cards can do this, and uh, they the public realize that, wait, there's databases now, and you don't have to walk all the way across Washington, d C. To get my file, which means you're not

gonna do that, So I'm safe. Now, you can cross reference things from agency to agency, and my information is just up for grabs way more than it ever was before. So in response, the federal government past the Federal Privacy Act of nineteen seventy for which basically says you can go up to the E p A. And be like, hey, Feds, I want to see my file and they have to show it to you. What's interesting is it certainly doesn't cover them getting the information for that file. No, it

just covers the dissemination of that information. And if you walked up to the FBI and said, hey, fed, let me see what you got on me? Yeah, sure, sure, come come in in. Can we get you some coffee? Like de Niro And when Lauren Braco comes to him at the end, he's like, no, no no, just a little further right there, right, see that get you for um? Yeah, if the FBI ever offers you a fur, just just walk away if you can't. Um. So that was a

that was a pretty landmark act um. And that's definitely one of the in addition to the Supreme Court's interpretation of the Constitution. It's it forms a pillar. The other pillar UM, strangely enough, came out of the Clinton years. Uh, and it is the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act HIPPO, which you might be familiar with from filling out like doctor's forms and stuff. Basically, it's saying like here's the HIPPO waiver, not portability, No portability, be weird. Because then

you could drink it. You can't drink an act. Sorry. Uh yeah. And that that basically covers medical information, things that like your doctor or your insurance provider can can disseminate about you. Right. Um. And so you put all that together and you have a pretty reasonable right to privacy and at the very least to see what the Feds have on you, depending on whether their law enforcement

or not. So if you are alive, these are the rights that are afforded to alive and a member of America, American family right a card carrying remember the moment you die though, that that Privacy Act, the Federal Privacy Act in four is like you're dead to me. You no longer are. You have no rights whatsoever under my umbrella. Ella. Ella. That is true, explicitly says so hippa is the opposite. It actually extends those rights very plainly to your family and says, you know what your family can uh is

now in charge of this, and it's completely transferred. The permission for information sharing is given completely to them. Right. The the um the whole aspect of well, it's your state, it's part of your state. Uh. The the basically the right to say Yeah, that person can have access to this medical and for that medical information whatever that passes to the survivor. So HIPPA is real strict federal privacy. It's like you're dead. HIPPA is like, yeah, you'll live

forever it can. It's called descendant or there's a there's a um descendency of the right. It's a descendible right. I'm sorry. And so too is something called the right of publicity. Yeah, this was pretty interesting. Yeah. So there's this thing that came out of the nineteen fifties when um baseball stars uh started saying like, hey, wait a minute, man, I I'm not that hip with this guy coming out and taking my picture and you know, setting it on tops and then tops making money. I should be able

to make some money. That's my picture. And everybody went, but these are just baseball cards. Yeah yeah, And then afterwards somebody, you know, one of the baseball players, said no, they're not there's more to it, and everybody said, okay,

maybe you're right. We give in baseball star. So that out of that came the idea of the right to publicity, which is a celebrity somebody who can make money off of their image, their likeness, their identity down to you or you down to Like Einstein's identity is owned um actually by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and willed it to him. And most people's identities are managed by their state.

And when you're talking about famous folks, right, there's also a company called um CMG Worldwide out of Indiana, unbelievable. Their their business model is collecting right to publicity, like drying them off of estates or managing them for states. But basically their their thing is licensing the identity of a dead person. So, um, do you remember wasn't it like a course commercial or whatever? And John Wayne was in it? Uh? I remember that? Might I sort of

remember that? But I definitely remember Fred Astair was in a Dirt Devil, Yeah commercial like dancing with the Broom. Right now, if he or the Broom became in the Dirt Devil, I think that was the deal right now, his if his family exercises the right to publicity of his estate, um, their devil paid to use his likeness. Yeah, I wish I would have remembered to look that up. I can't remember which way that one went because there

was a stink over it. Well, the thing is is likely even if you are big on privacy right, um, your right to publicity is tack si bowl. So even if Fred's Fredis stairs Air said no, he wanted to rest in peace, he didn't want to do any more dancing, especially now c G I dance, and he just wanted to be dead, they likely did charge for that rather than just granting permission, because they have to pay taxes on the right to publicity whether they use it or not.

Do they figure that, I don't know. I think that might have been gene Kelly. Actually, come to think of it, No, I think it was Fredi Stair. I'm picturing gene Kelly. Huh, Well, you know, will eventually know. Maybe gene Kelly was the broom. Ye, gene Kelly was always the broom to Fredis Stair. It's not fair. Uh. It varies And actually in most of the world the right of publicity does in at death, but in the US it's a state law issue, and

um New York it terminates at death. But other states like Tennessee, Washington, and Indiana, which governed the rights of Elvis Presley, Jimi Hendrix, and CMG is based out of India and a probably no accident. They say the control of the identity is secured for a term from ranges from like a hundred years to forever, right, which is really interesting. And like we said, it's the person's image,

it's their likeness, it's their identity. And like the Hebrew University of Jerusalem sued um some costume maker for creating out a wig and a mustache that was, you know, based on Einstein. Well did they call it the Einstein though? Probably because I went wig shopping the other night? I really did for l c POS playing a come as your Favorite rock Star party, so we're like, well we gotta be dressed up as well. So we went wig shopping and they had that's where And this was before

we knew we were even doing this podcast. They had wigs that were clearly people living in dead but they were just named something different right now, like shock Jock was the Howard Stern. They had an Amy winehouse one called the rehab wig. She see now her family probably just doesn't aware of that. I'm sure they would have a lawsuit on their hands. They could sue an American cord if it's an American company. Um, see if you can guess top hat rocker Edgar Winner. Ah, that's good

slash who slash, of course. But what was funny was among this wall of wigs of thinly veiled names, that was a snooky wig and it was snooky yeah, with her face on it. So she was like, sure, I'll take money make a wig. Yeah, well, yeah, wouldn't you if you were snooky? I'd do it if I was chuck. Um. So that's the right right to publicity. That and the hip of protection are descendable rights. So it's passed along. And Einstein, his estate makes seventy six million dollars a year.

They did in the last five million, five years, oh five combined. Yeah, but that's that's a lot. That's an yeah, and that's I'm Stein, and like I knew Elvis and Hendricks and those guys, and like, actually Marilyn Monrose in the public domain energy, Yes she is. And there's a there was a fight over that the California tried to um basically pass like a lover boy law. It just made up that term, but it makes sense. Where they said that everyone has to work for the weekend, everyone

has to wear bandanas. Um, where they said, like Marilyn Monrose estate is part of the right to publicity as a descendable UM thing. Uh, And I guess somebody didn't want that that way, and they went to the trouble approving that. Um. She was a resident of New York at the time of death, so t s well. And it's it's fortuitous that you mentioned Monroe, or maybe I did, because autopsy photos come into play here, and her death photos arguably among the sexiest death photos of all time.

Probably autopsy photos of generally and murder scene photos have been generally protect did Ah from release When someone submits for the Freedom of Information Act and says, hey, we want to see these photos, and the courts have generally says no, you know what, you can't right well with Freedom of Information Act, that's this thing, that's this um spearhead into the heart of hip and the Freedom of

Privacy Act because it's this catch twenty two. It's like the government is tasked with if they're going to gather information on you and keep it, they have to protect it. It's your privacy. But government also has to be transparent. And somebody asks about that your information, the government has to give it to them under a Freedom of Information Act, unless again, if it has to do with law enforcement,

they're just gonna turn you down out right. But on a case by case basis, it's usually decided whether or not they're gonna grant it, and a lot of times they kick it to the courts and let the courts decide, And there have been some big ones. Usually the court rules in favor of rules against the freedom of information, especially when they feels like there's going to be harm to the family. Yeah, if it's harmless or if it's

been like many many years, they might allow it. But uh, the one that that the Grabster mentions in here was the Vincent Foster case, who was the attorney who killed himself in nine who worked for the Clintons or the Clinton administration, And uh, he was no, he was I think a Whitewater guy too. He was like the Clintons for a while. Well, when he committed suicide, there were photographs of the scene and they were not made public.

So conspiracy people filed an fo I a whatever report you have to fill out, and said we want to see these photos, and they said no. Yeah. Apparently the guy still managed to get four polaroids released, which was an effort. Yeah, um cold for him. If you want to spend you're well a full day at least, just go ahead and type in Vince Foster. I'm sure click on what really happened? Dot com, um thing on it. It's it's extensive, exhaustive, I'm sure um so, yeah, they'll Earnhardt.

More recently, was you know he crashed and killed, was killed and at the dayton of five. Did you r here? He apparently died like flipping off the guy who like, uh really who spun him out? Yeah, that's what I heard. It's a nice way to go out at last. Screw you, buddy. Uh they uh. Florida courts rejected um the plea to release those photos in the newspaper and the Supreme Court they said, you know what, we'ren't even gonna entertain this case.

Bye bye. Yeah, Florida's Florida passed a law, another lover boy law, for to prevent these these photos from being released. That's a that's a lover boy law. I was silent because I was scanning my prank for another lover boy line, but I couldn't make it one, um chuck. Even more recent than Dale Earnhardt's death, that whole kfuffle over his death photos. UM, well, there's been a couple, but one was the News of the World phone hacking scandal. I

don't know about that one. Okay, let me let me enlighten you to the despicable nous of what News of the World was capable of. Anne was doing for a while. The world is UM. It's a it's not weekly world news. Yeah, r I p that that was. It's not UM, it's a news Core, which is Rupert Murdoch owned UM paper that's now under It was headed by a woman named Rebecca Brooks and she's now gone. As a matter of fact, News of the World is gone because of all this.

They were hacking, like the voicemail accounts of like everybody, the royals, celebrities. But the one that was really just really awful, UM was the voicemail of a third ten year old girl named Millie Dowler who in two thousand two went missing. While she was missing, this is a big,

big news in England. UM, News of the World had some private detective hack her voicemail and we're listening to her voicemail messages and the mailbox was full, so they started deleting them so that people could leave more if if possible, so they could hack more in report on more. What were they trying to get? Just any information they possibly could because the girl was still missing. She was dead at the time, but now trying to get clues.

They were trying to get more leads. A full mailbox and a dead girl who's not getting her mail isn't going to help anybody as far as news of the world was going. So they just deleted some after they listened and written stories on them, trying to get news story leads, not all stories like. No one had any idea they were doing this, so the girl's parents thought she was still alive and was deleting her email or her voicemail. Um, yeah, so it was a very big deal.

It also threw off the cops too, that they hindered the investigation. So everybody who has anything to do with that has now been executed by the state in Great Britain. That brings up a good point though, is this stuff a crime and uh exhort It depends on the law. Um, Hippa actually does enforce criminal penalties if you knowingly share medical information like selling Madonna's paps Mere for instance. You could be put in jail for that. I almost just

did a spit take a genuine one that happened. No, it was in it was in the movie Slacker. Okay man, that was close. But a bet stuff like that does happen for sure, um more often than not, though they'll there will be civil penalties instead of criminal ones, and you won't be going to jail. But you can slander someone after death, you can, well, depending on what state you're in, they don't call it slander. You can what

you want after death. It's it's well, there's anti defamation laws in like California is one state that was the only state I could find. In most states it's like, no, you can say whatever you want about somebody after they they've died. But there's something of a movement toward getting anti defamation laws in place for the deceased. And based on this philosophical debate like can you harm a dead person? What do you think? What's your opinion? Uh, I don't know.

It seems like it would be a nice thing for your privacy rights to extend after death, but I mean in the in the name of respecting the dead right, But so in the US, you've noticed, like most of the court cases were they were looking out for the family, the survivors. This this is about like the person, the individual. Even people who like you don't know any of the survivors. They lived long enough ago that no one has any idea.

But the whole basis of it is that like through our lifetime, through our life's work, our accomplishments are reputes nations, we build this thing that's called an identity, a legacy, and it survives us after death. And that's what can be defamed. And that's how you can harm a dead person, if you believe that you can harm a dead person. And so that's kind of the basis of the drive to get people on board, like, hey, let's all just

be nice about dead people. But well, and in the day, in this day and age of the electronic life, your emails, your Facebook account, like it brings up a whole different can actually, can I tell you a really really sad, tragic story. Always speaking of Facebook, I found a old friend from twenty five years ago on Facebook by chance, and I was like, oh, I haven't thought of her in literally twenty five years. She looks great, how she

doing center her friend request, blah blah blah. I was kind of on her Facebook page and then I saw a photo of her with with her kid that said and someone said, like a very bitter sweet to look at this, And I thought, oh, man, I guess her kid must have passed away. That's awful. Scrolled down a little more. She had passed away, like two weeks previous. This girl of like in the middle of the night passed away. I was on her face, had already sent the friend request, and I was like, oh my god.

And for some reason it just stuck with me for a few days. It was I haven't seen her in that long, but I was just like, all of a sudden, there's his Facebook page with pictures everywhere, and hey, this was me last week and now I'm not here. And then you know, her kids had posted, you know, like they kind of took over her account, where people were leaving memorial messages and things like that. So and they bring up in the article. You know, typically ninety days

after an inactive account, they'll shut it down. I don't know if that's Facebook specific, but um well, Facebook apparently has a policy in place where if you can prove your family member or something like that, they will revert control of it to you to basically basically becomes memorial page. Like, um, yeah, you mean his friends with d J A M on Facebook for some reason. Yeah, so, and she still is and his page is now like a memorial page. People post on it like a couple of times a day

every day. Still well, and I think that's what Facebook is trying to create here with their whole new system that's rolling out, is like, this is your life, yes, and we own it. Yeah. Um. If you want to know more about basically what we're talking about is whether or not you leave a digital legacy afterwards. Stuff to blow your mind. Our colleagues Robert and Julie covered that, didn't,

They have stuff to blow your mind? So you can search that UM on iTunes, or you can go to the Stuff to Blow your Mind r s S page just by searching stuff to Blow your Mind RSS on your favorite search engine. And if you want to read this really good article by the grabster um, you can search do you have a right to privacy after you die? How about privacy after death? In this search bar at how stuff works dot com. And since I said search bar,

that means, of course, it's time for a listener mail. Josh, I'm gonna call this something you called it, which is cult busters. Oh yeah, this is good. I didn't call it that the author did. I was at in the subject on Yeah. Hey, guys, have a great story for you. About fifteen years ago, my uncle's wife passed away from cancer. He became disillusioned with his religion. At the time. He had a coworker who, in an effort to help him cope with his grief and confusion, invited him to attend

his church. Well, it turned out to be a cult, and his coworker was a recruiter. It wasn't exactly a destructive cult in terms of violence. There were no drugs to get them closer to aliens, no suicides, no murders, etcetera. Uh, they're pretty peaceful, polygamous group, following some basic Judaeo Christian principles. They didn't all live on the ranch a ranch, but

they did all live in the same town. When my uncle joined, the prophet of the cult gave him a wife pretty nice welcome, it's a welcome gift, and put him to work. My uncle soon came to be one of the prophet's top men. Our family knew that he was given several wives, but in his communications with us, he would only ever tell us about his first wife and his children by her. Fast forward to a few

months ago. My uncle's daughter is fourteen years old. The prophet of the cult ordered his daughter, my cousin, to be married to another man in the group. My uncle, for the first time in a long time, thinks like a normal person and becomes uncomfortable with the situation. He had never once questioned what he had been told. He never even considered that he was part of a cult. He just considered it a small religion. He really struggled

with this after that. He consumed as much as he could from that point about cults in groups like his, and among that he actually listened to your very podcast about cults. That is awesomely awesome. He realized that he was in the very wrong and he had to get out. Since he was trusted and respected by many other members, he was able to convince many other higher ups and lay members that they were also in a bad cult

and that they had to get out. My uncle and many of the others were excommunicated, and the cult now numbers the cults numbers now are very much dwindling. So I would like to thank you personally for your involvement in my uncle's return to real life. I'm sure he still would have left the cult, but the extra nudge of your podcast was sure to help him along. And that is from Anonymous. That is amazing. How about that

so help busting? Yeah, that was really something else. I mean, I'm not one to begrudge anybody their religious beliefs or anything like that, but if we can provide information that helps people come to a decision they're comfortable with, I'm proud of that done. Yeah, So thank you Anonymous for that letter, that very excellent letter. That Uh wow, I mean that's like we should have that's legit t shirts

or something like that. Helpbusters. Yeah. Um, if you have a story about how the the podcast stuff you should know has helped your life, we want to hear it or harmed it. I want it's a good one, just just not that, not how it's affected it in no way whatsoever, And we don't want to hear about that. Um, you can tweet that to us in a hundred forty

characters are less two s y SK podcast. You can write it on Facebook at Facebook dot com, slash stuff you should know which will be up for eternity um, or you can send us a good old fashioned email to Stuff Podcast at how stuff works dot com. Be sure to check out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join how Stuff Work staff as we explore the most promising and perplexing possibilities tomorrow, brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camry. It's ready, are you