Announcements

The report released today by the Federal Trade Commission analyzing expenditures by food and beverage marketers to target both children and teens shows a dramatic increase in the use of digital marketing.  According to the report, "spending on new media, such as online, mobile, and viral marketing, increased by 50%."  The report also underscored how young people are the target of "integrated" campaigns, pursued across the "

The dramatic growth of the data broker industry, fueled by  information on consumers culled from the Internet, social media, mobile phones, and in-store shopping,  has created a multitude of all seeing eyes spying on Americans everyday.  A digital gold mine of infinite details is harvested about each of us--what we buy, who are friends are, how much we earn, our ethnicity, health concerns, location, etc.   For the most part, these records are off limits to consumers, who can't really discover what they say about us--including the likely errors they may contain.

The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) protects children's privacy online.  It is a powerful safeguard empowering parents to make decisions about how personal information from their child can be collected and used.  As the Federal Trade Commission nears its historic vote to ensure that COPPA addresses the range of digital data collection practices that threaten child privacy--including from behavioral profiling and geo-location targeting--here's a brief primer.