FTC says it won't intervene to protect Internet user privacy

[meegbear]

The Federal Trade Commission indicated Wednesday that it would leave it to data-mining Web companies and Internet marketers to decide how best to protect users' privacy.

"Self-regulation may be the preferable approach for this dynamic marketplace," Lydia Parnes, the director of the commission's Bureau of Consumer Protection, told a Senate committee.

The FTC's decision not to step in — even as Microsoft and Google representatives testified that some regulation would be helpful — means that Washington won't address the matter before a new administration and Congress take office in January.

At issue is what privacy rights consumers have when data-mining companies use their Web browsing patterns to target them for ads. It's a gold mine for online advertising and Internet marketing, but consumer and e-privacy groups say it's intrusive.

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http://www.mcclatchydc.com/244/story/43575.html

[SpiralHawk]

1. Yeah, like we were expecting republicon cronies to do anything at all...

...to protect the Constitutional rights of Americans to privacy.

Yeah, right.

[gratuitous]

2. I have a feeling . . .

Any company that gets too aggressive will be dealt with, possibly in quite summary fashion, by a coterie of folks far more knowledgeable about the internet and its workings than me. When a few businesses get run out of cyberspace for being assholes, they'll go whining to their big corporation pals in Washington, and the Federal Trade Commission's interest will be awakened then.

[DrDan]

3. based on the FISA vote yesterday, why would ANYONE feel

they have a right to privacy on the internet?

[Marrah_G]

4. Of course they won't- Our government no longer respects our right to privacy

[spanone]

5. self-regulation...yea that worked great in the mortgage market..in other words..fuck the consumers

[crikkett]

6. Such laziness.

[Beausoleil]

7. Translation from bureaucratese:

"Do you really think we're here to protect the consumer?" - Lydia Parnes, the director of the FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection