After four years of negotiations, the EU Commission, Parliament, and Council have reached a final agreement on the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). The GDPR is an omnibus data protection law which sets arguably the most extensive data protection laws globally, along with strong enforcement authority. The new law contains ...
WPF Executive Director Pam Dixon will be presenting a two hour technology and privacy training at the National Network to End Domestic Violence Tech Summit. The training will be geared to professionals who work with survivors of domestic violence, stalking, and related issues. The workshop will cover the key emerging ...
An important report came out today from the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, the board that was appointed to be a privacy watchdog for the US government surveillance programs. The newly released report covers PRISM and other Section 702 surveillance programs conducted under the US Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The report is complex, and provides important benchmarking on how PRISM and "upstream" surveillance programs work. The report's recommendations, however, are what have proven to be more controversial.
Resource | case file -- Amazon.com filed a lawsuit in April to fight the North Carolina Department of Revenue's request for detailed information on Amazon.com customers. The North Carolina tax department requested Amazon.com to hand over "all information for all sales to customers with a North Carolina shipping address" between 2003 to 2010. In the decision, Seattle, Washington U.S. District Court Judge Marsha J. Pechman wrote, "Citizens are entitled to receive information and ideas through books, films, and other expressive materials anonymously." She also stated that "The fear of government tracking and censoring one\'s reading, listening, and viewing choices chills the exercise of First Amendment rights." This is an important decision for privacy rights, and online privacy in particular.
Genetic privacy -- The World Privacy Forum filed comments today with the Department of Labor requesting that the DOL expand its protections of how genetic information may be used by health insurance companies or group health plans. The World Privacy Forum urged the DOL to include genetic information posted on social networking sites in its consideration of the GINA regulations.
Internet privacy -- The World Privacy Forum's guide on how to opt-out of tracking cookies has undergone a complete update. We have added new cookie opt-outs and have updated all of our descriptions of where and how to opt out of online ad tracking.
OECD | Fair Information Practices -- At a key meeting of the OECD on the future of the Internet economy, the OECD Secretary General Angel Gurria reaffirmed support of the 1980 OECD Privacy Principles. Also, Secretary General Angel Gurria expressed support for formalizing the participation of civil society in OECD going forward and for paying more attention to information security and identity theft problems. Secretary General Gurria noted that "A more decentralised, networked approach to policy formulation for the Internet Economy that includes the active participation of stakeholders needs to be the norm." Many parts of the recent OECD meeting may be viewed online.
Internet privacy -- The World Privacy Forum, Privacy Rights Clearinghouse and EPIC were joined by California-based EFF, the ACLU of Northern California, Consumer Action, Consumer Federation of California and other national groups in asking Google's CEO Eric Schmidt to provide a prominent link to the Google privacy policy directly from its home page. Google has recently been criticized for not providing a link to its privacy policy from its home page, as the California Online Privacy Protection Act requires. The groups noted that linking to a privacy policy on a home page is considered a widespread best practice.
Consensus document | Consumer rights and protections -- Nine privacy and consumer groups, including the World Privacy Forum, unveiled a consensus document outlining key consumer rights and protections in the behavioral advertising sector. The document is directed toward the Federal Trade Commission, and urges the FTC to take proactive steps to adequately protect consumers as online and other forms of behavioral tracking and targeting become more ubiquitous. The consensus document was filed with the Secretary of the FTC and its commissioners. Behavioral advertising is the focus of the FTC's eHavioral Advertising Town Hall meeting taking place November 1-2 in Washington, D.C. The network advertising sector has a self-regulatory plan, the Network Advertising Initiative, in place, and has had this plan in place since 2000. The consensus document addresses the many areas where the NAI plan has failedto protect consumers.
Internet privacy -- The World Privacy Forum announced today that it would be filing a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission about the posting by AOL of a portion of its users’ search data on the Internet. While the data was not expressly identified by name, the search queries themselves included in some cases personally identifiable information such as individuals’ names, Social Security Numbers, and myriad other personal information. The World Privacy Forum urges consumers to take precautions when using search engines.
Internet privacy -- Working to proactively prevent problems related to the use of search engines is preferable to trying to clean up privacy problems after the fact. Here are some tips and resources for enhancing search engine privacy.
Financial and Internet privacy -- Before you call, click, or mail away for your federally mandated free credit report, read these tips to help you avoid potential problems. This consumer tip sheet includes graphics to show you what problematic "fake" free credit sites look like, and includes consumer-tested tips for safely receiving your free reports. The tip sheet also includes resources with information, phone numbers, and addresses for ordering your report.