A coalition of 22 consumer and public health advocacy groups called on the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) to investigate the preschool app market. The advocates’ letter urges the FTC to hold app makers accountable for unfair and deceptive practices, including falsely marketing apps that require in-app purchases as “free” and manipulating children to watch ads and make purchases.

The Center for Digital Democracy provides the following recommendations for comprehensive baseline Federal privacy legislation. We are building on our expertise addressing digital marketplace developments for more than two decades, including work leading to the enactment of the 1998 Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act--the only federal online privacy law in the United States. Our recommendations are also informed by our long-standing trans-Atlantic work with consumer and privacy advocates in Europe, as well as the General Data Protection Regulation.

Leading consumer privacy organizations in the United States write to express surprise and concern that not a single consumer representative was invited to testify at the September 26 Senate Commerce Committee hearing
“Examining Safeguards for Consumer Data Privacy.”

The Center for Digital Democracy (CDD), Berkeley Media Studies Group, and Color of Change urge the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to specifically
acknowledge the important issues involving the privacy and welfare of young people by adding this issue to its proposed hearing agenda on competition and consumer welfare.

The Center for Digital Democracy (CDD) respectfully urges the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to adopt regulations to ensure that voters will have meaningful transparency and control over the digital data and marketing practices used in elections today. The FEC must boldly act and use its legal authority and leadership position to enact—as well as recommend—much-needed safeguards.

Consumer advocates, digital rights, and civil rights groups are calling on U.S. companies to adopt the requirements of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) as a baseline in the U.S. and worldwide.

Companies processing personal data* in the U.S. and/or worldwide and which are subject to the GDPR in the European Union, ought to:

The European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will take effect May 25, 2018. The Trans Atlantic Consumer Dialogue (TACD), of which CDD is a member, published a document detailing 10 things that US citizens and companies need to know about the forthcoming General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

WASHINGTON, DC—April 9, 2018—Today, a coalition of leading U.S. child advocacy, consumer, and privacy groups represented by the Institute for Public Representation filed a complaint(link is external) urging the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to investigate and sanction Google for violations of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) in operating YouTube. Google claims that YouTube is only for users 13 and up, despite being the most popular online platform for children, used by 80% of American children ages 6 to 12. 

Today’s political candidates and issue campaigns are fully integrated into the growing Big Data marketing infrastructure, with more and more companies in this sphere accelerating the pace of research and innovation and promising to transform how political campaigns and elections are conducted. Data management platforms, marketing clouds, and other new data services enable information about one’s finances, health, race, ethnicity, shopping behavior, and geo-location to be combined with political interests, reading habits, and voting records.