Consumer Privacy Bill Of Rights Only Touches The Surface

Today Washington addressed growing concerns in online privacy by unveiling a framework for a Consumer Privacy Bill Of Rights.  While the bill helps provide more privacy from the visible threat, aka companies you have day-to-day relationships with such as Google, Apple, Yahoo, and Microsoft, it is still largely ignoring the massive industry that is built on selling your personal information behind the scenes.  

This is from the White House privacy white paper:

Still, data brokers and other companies that collect personal data without direct consumer interactions or a reasonably detectable presence in consumer-facing activities should seek innovative ways to provide consumers with effective Individual Control. If it is impractical to provide Individual Control, these companies should ensure that they implement other elements of the Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights in ways that adequately protect consumers’ privacy. For example, to provide sufficient privacy protections, such companies may need to go to extra lengths to implement other principles such as Transparency—by providing clear, public explanations of the roles they play in commercial uses of personal data—as well as providing appropriate use controls once information is collected under the Access and Accuracy and Accountability principles to compensate for the lack of a direct consumer relationship.

At this stage the bill is requiring no extra requirements on these data brokers, meaning that most Americans are still clueless to the fact that their personal information is not only being sold behind their backs, but is easily accessible to anyone with an internet connection. 

While Washington is taking a step in the right direction, the new bill is only touching the surface of an issue and industry that needs more visibility, transparency, and regulation.

-Noah