FTC To Congress: Your Turn to Deal with Data Privacy
The FTC unveiled its much-anticipated privacy report Monday, urging data companies to give consumers more choice and transparency over their information, and spurring lawmakers to pass laws that hold data companies to account (http://xrl.us/bmzh4v). FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz made good on his promise not to impose any regulatory rules but he demanded that industry offer “more and better protections for consumers."
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The FTC committed to working with industry stakeholders to further the development of self-regulatory efforts and codes of conduct. The agency urged companies to build in privacy protections for consumers at every stage of product development; offer a do-not-track mechanism for simple control of data; and increase transparency and access to the data that companies collect about consumers. Though the commission will not require companies to adopt privacy policies, the agency would require companies to adhere to their privacy policies and would enforce any violations with its Section 5 authority over unfair or deceptive practices.
"More work needs to be done” to develop and implement an effective and persistent do-not-track option for consumers, Leibowitz said. Online advertisers, major browser companies, the World Wide Web Consortium have made “great strides” in developing a do-not-track mechanism, he said, and “90 percent of all advertisers really support do-not-track.” But Leibowitz warned that if a successful industry option does not emerge by the end of the year “there will be a lot of support” for lawmakers to pass do-not-track legislation.
The FTC’s approach to consumer privacy should be applied to the mobile space, Leibowitz said, and the agency plans a workshop May 30 to discuss ways to offer short, effective and accessible mobile privacy disclosures. Though screen sizes can limit the amount of information that can be displayed on a phone, companies should offer just-in-time privacy notices that can be read on one screen quickly, he said. As for geolocaction privacy, the FTC is currently collecting comments on how to prevent the inappropriate use of such sensitive data and will attempt to address them later this year, Leibowitz said.
The report urges data brokers to create a centralized website where consumers can view information about the data that’s collected on them. Consumers don’t have any interaction with the “cyberazzi” that collect information about their browsing habits, Leibowitz said. The FTC advocates legislation that gives consumers greater access and control of their data, to “fill some of these gaps,” he said, without endorsing specific privacy or data security bills.
There are “special concerns” with large platform providers who have first-party consumer relationships that give them access to behavioral activity data that’s beyond the context of the first-party relationship, the agency said. The FTC said questions remain about the use of social plug-ins like Facebook’s “Like” button which allows the company to track users’ browsing data across different websites and ISPs’ use of deep packet inspection. The commission plans to host a public workshop in the second half of 2012 to explore the heightened privacy concerns related to such comprehensive tracking practices.