A story in the The Telegraph, a UK newspaper, recounts a story of a man, Dave Moorhouse, whose microchipped Jack Russell terrier was stolen. Although the microchip company knows the dog's location, Moorhouse is prevented from finding the dog's location due to the Data Protection Act. You can read the story here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/family/pets/8015956/Dog-owner-prevented-from-finding-microchipped-pet-under-Data-Protection-Act.html.
Moorhouse argues to the microchip provider that the reason he microchipped his pet was to find the pet if it was ever lost or stolen. When they refused to release the dog's whereabouts, Moorhouse took the case to court but the court upheld the decision to not release the location due to the Data Protection Act. The microchip provider stated that Moorhouse has the option of reporting the theft to the police and the police "can demand the details of the dog's location be disclosed, where appropriate". However, Moorhouse did so and the police concluded that "there was no criminal case to answer".
Lessig illustrates that four modalities regulate cyberspace: law, norms, the market, and architecture. The values that are in conflict here are protecting data and protecting dog ownership. The modalities that are in conflict in this situation are the law, norms, and architecture. The norm would uphold that Moore owns his dog and when someone else takes his dog it is considered stealing. The law states that although the microchip company knows where Moore's dog is, they are prevented from identifying the location due to the Data Protection Act. Finally, architecture, or the technology of the microchip, is at play because only the microchip company has access to the whereabouts of Moore's dog once reported to them. It would be a different scenario if Moore could also have access to the whereabouts of his dog perhaps through online access to a tracking service provided by the microchip.
I think that Moore could have seen a solution to his problem with the current constraints in place. I do not understand why the police concluded that "there was no criminal case to answer". If they concluded that there was criminal activity they could have forced the microchip company to release the dogs whereabouts.
Regardless, an alternative approach for addressing the problem would be to enhance the microchip technology by allowing real-time tracking of one's pet. In the situation with Moorhouse, what prevented him from knowing the location of his dog was that the "new owners" (or as I would call them, thieves) reported to the microchip company their location and then the company was obligated to protect that location. The microchip company would not have known the dogs location had it not been reported to them. However, if the microchip company provided a tracking GPS service, the owner could always know the location of their dog and the Data Protection Act would not prevent release of this data. The only change that would be needed for this solution would be to the architecture/technology of the microchip which would then provide owners protection from lost or stolen dogs while still protecting data according to the Data Protection Act.
Lessig cites Polk Wagner who argues that the "interaction among these modalities is dynamic". (p130) This means that changing the constraints of any one of them may affect the others. In my example, changing the technology of the microchip to provide GPS tracking may affect the law or market. The Data Protection Act may be changed to include information about GPS tracking. Or, by adding the GPS tracking technology, the demand for microchipping may skyrocket and subsequently the manufacturers of microchips may hike the price so that few can afford the service - which could exasperate the problem of stolen and lost dogs.
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