On December 1, 2010, the Federal Trade Commission issued a preliminary report entitled "Protecting Consumer Privacy in an Era of Rapid Change, A Proposed Framework for Businesses and Policymakers". The report proposes a framework to balance the privacy interests of consumers with innovation that relies on consumer information to develop beneficial new products and services.
Several important privacy issues were in the news in the first half of this week. Here's our take on these stories, which covered online data collection, employee privacy and legislative battles about the future of privacy.
Today's New York Times Media Decoder Blog features an "on-the-record" discussion with Federal Trade Commission chairman Jon Leibowitz and Bureau of Consumer Protection chief David Vladeck. The question presented: "Has Internet Gone Beyond Privacy Policies?" The FTC (and Congress, for that matter) continue to signal that change may be imminent in the world of online privacy policies and traditional notions of opt-out consent.
As we noted earlier this week, Massachusetts indicated late last week it would issue its last round of amendments to its data security regulations scheduled to take effect March 1, 2010, 201 CMR 17.00. The last round of amendments are not particularly significant, although it is worth noting that, contrary to the amendments made in August, this round clarifies that the regulations cover any entity that even stores personal information of Massachusetts residents, in addition to those that receive, maintain, process, or otherwise have access to personal information. Here is the press release from the Office of Consumer Affairs and Business Regulation. Here is the final version of the Regulations. Doug Cornelius has a great analysis here. The effective date of the regulations is still March 1, 2010.