“Ultimately, in a free market competition would ensure that customers’ privacy was protected as much as possible, consistent with other desirable product features. In this sense we can say the market provides the ‘optimal’ or ‘efficient’ amount of privacy. If a bank had poor safeguards and its clients’ personal information repeatedly were stolen by hackers, it would eventually go out of business. Third-party agencies could provide consumers with ratings on privacy issues for various businesses. In contrast, nobody gets to fire the FBI if they think its warrantless searches and wiretaps — not to mention all the tax dollars it receives — are too high a price to pay for the ’services’ it provides in, say, finding anthrax killer(s).” (08/27/08)