The "Overview of the Privacy Act of 1974," prepared by the Department of Justice's Office of Privacy and Civil Liberties (OPCL), is a discussion of the Privacy Act's disclosure prohibition, its access and amendment provisions, and its agency recordkeeping requirements. Tracking the provisions of the Act itself, the Overview provides reference to, and legal analysis of, court decisions interpreting the Act's provisions.

S.3418, commonly referred to as the Privacy Act of 1974 (Pub. L. No.93-579, 88 Stat.1896), was enacted into law on December 31, 1974. This law is characterized by the U.S. Department of Justice as "an omnibus 'code of fair information practices' that attempts to regulate the collection, maintenance, use, and dissemination of personal information by federal executive branch agencies." The legislative history of this law prepared jointly by the U.S. Senate Committee on Government Operations, chaired by Senator Abraham Ribicoff, and the U.S., House Government Operations Subcommittee on Government Information and Individual Rights, chaired by Rep. Bella Abzug; the full House committee was chaired by Rep. Jack Brooks. This history contains the text of the major bills considered by the House and Senate, with accompanying reports, the text of House and Senate Floor debate, related explanatory materials and case law, and regulatory documents issued pursuant to the public law

You can hardly pass through customs at an airport today without having your picture taken and your fingertips scanned, that information then stored in an archive you'll never see. Nor can you use your home's smart technology without wondering what, exactly, that technology might do with all you've shared with it: shopping habits, security decisions, media choices. Every day, Americans surrender their private information to entities that claim to have their best interests in mind, in exchange for a promise of safety or convenience. This trade-off has long been taken for granted, but the extent of its nefariousness has recently become much clearer. As Lawrence Cappello's None of Your Damn Business reveals, the problem is not so much that data will be used in ways we don't want, but rather how willing we have been to have our information used, abused, and sold right back to us. In this startling book, Cappello shows that this state of affairs was not the inevitable by-product of technological progress. He targets key moments from the past 130 years of US history when privacy was central to battles over journalistic freedom, national security, surveillance, big data, and reproductive rights. As he makes dismayingly clear, Americans have had numerous opportunities to protect the public good while simultaneously safeguarding personal information, and we've squandered them every time. The wide range of the debates and incidents presented here shows that, despite America's endless rhetoric or individual freedom, we actually have some of the weakest privacy protections in the developed world. None of Your Damn Business is a rich and provocative survey of an alarming topic that grows only more relevant with each fresh outrage of trust betrayed. -- Dust jacket flap.