Abstract

This article claims that an ‘enclosure of the commons’ is underway, which reaches far beyond intellectual property, to a point where, through profiling, ‘identity’ has itself become enclosed property that can be owned by another. With a detour through the natures of both money and innovation, this paper looks at the imperative driving ‘intellectual property rights.’ By introducing the notion of biopiracy, it shows how ‘invasion of privacy’ is justified, and ends with “a world of rapacious, state-aided ‘privatization’” of enclosed identity: the ultimate identity theft