1) In a communication network, an ability granted to a station in regard to accessing another station. For example, one station may grant read-only privileges for a certain area of its memory to a second station; and it may grant both read and write privileges for that same area of its memory to a third station. 2) In software use, an ability granted to a user in regard to accessing functions. For example, one user may be granted the privilege to change the configuration and another user may be granted only the privilege to monitor the configuration values.