Person

Sarah E. Igo

Bylines

Defining Privacy—and Then Getting Rid of It

The beginnings of the end of private life in the late nineteenth century.

by Sarah E. Igo via Lapham’s Quarterly on May 15, 2018
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The Equifax Breach Has Potentially Catastrophic Consequences

Credit reporting companies' immense power and lack of transparency puts consumers at risk.

by Sarah E. Igo via Made By History on September 26, 2017

The Known Citizen: A History of Privacy in Modern America

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In America's Panopticon

Sarah Igo’s "The Known Citizen" examines the linked histories of privacy and surveillance in the United States.

by Katie Fitzpatrick via The Nation on December 6, 2018

Rows of men seated at computer terminals at Kennedy Space Center, 1967.

America’s Privacy Policy

Recent news coverage has called the Privacy Act of 1974 “Watergate-inspired,” but such framing misses the big picture.

by Jillian Foley via HNN on September 30, 2025

Cover of the 1973 report "Computers, Records, and the Rights of Citizens."

60 Years Ago, Congress Warned Us About the Surveillance State. What Happened?

The same legal and cultural struggles will await the next critical infrastructural technology, and the next.

by Jennifer Holt via The MIT Press Reader on September 27, 2024

George Gallup reenacting his polling methods on a talk show.

The Problems with Polls

Political polling’s greatest achievement is its complete co-opting of our understanding of public opinion, which we can no longer imagine without it.

by Samuel Earle via New York Review of Books on September 26, 2024

Evelyn Nesbit Thaw dodging a camera, 1909.

Overexposed

What happened to privacy when Americans gained easy access to cameras in the Gilded Age?

by Sohini Desai via HNN on July 2, 2024

Numbering the Dead

A brief history of death tolls.

by Shannon Pufahl via New York Review of Books on April 21, 2020

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