Curbing Companies’ Bad Behavior Will Require Stronger Data Privacy Laws and a New Federal Data Privacy Agency

Federal Privacy Laws Are Antiquated and Need Updating; New Data Privacy Legislation Must Include Civil Rights Protections and Enhanced Punishments for Violations

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.

Online political misinformation and false news have already resurfaced in the 2018 midterm elections. CDD has produced a short e-guide to help voters understand how online media platforms can be hijacked to fan political polarization and social conflict. Enough Already!

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.

The European Union's updated data protection legislation comes into effect in Europe on May 25, 2018.  It gives individuals new rights to better control their personal information and strengthens some of the rights that already exist.  Enforcement and redress mechanisms have also been strengthened to ensure that these rights are respected.  And – importantly – the definition of personal data is wider in the GDPR than in the current EU legislation, and now includes online identifiers, such as an IP address. Read the summary of the eight rights here.

The right

In an open letter to Facebook's CEO Mark Zuckkerberg, members of the Transatlantic Consumer Dialogue urge the company "to confirm your company’s commitment to global compliance with the GDPR".

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.

The phone and cable lobby will use its new power over the Internet to further erode the privacy rights of Americans.  Comcast, AT&T, and Verizon will be entirely free to tap into the data flowing from our mobile devices, PCs, gaming and streaming platforms and set-top boxes.  These ISP giants have already built up a formidable commercial data gathering and Big Data analytics infrastructure.  Now they will expand their gathering of our personal information, inc.