Legislators Demand Answers About Online Tracking
News that online companies often track and collect data about the online patterns of users raised the ire of two prominent members of Congress, who sent a letter Thursday demanding answers from more than a dozen companies. Congress probably lacks the time to pass major privacy legislation this year, said Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., who considering a bill and didn’t co-sign the letter. A series of Wall Street Journal articles starting Saturday said online companies often install consumer-tracking technologies on personal computers when users visit their sites. That spurred Reps. Ed Markey, D-Mass., and Joe Barton, R-Texas, to write 15 companies identified in the series, demanding they answer a slew of questions on their data collection practices. http://markey.house.gov/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=4079&Itemid=125
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"We are troubled by the findings in this report, which suggest that the price of consumers’ unfettered use of the Internet increasingly is surrender of their personal information, preferences and intimate details to websites, data monitoring companies, marketers and other information gathering firms that seek to track them online and develop digital dossiers for a range of purposes, including marketing,” wrote the two, who co-chair the House Bi-Partisan Privacy Caucus. “As Congress prepares to consider comprehensive privacy legislation, we request responses to the questions that follow to better understand your companies’ practices in this area."
Markey and Barton followed with a series of pointed questions, including: (1) What information companies collected about consumers, either themselves or through third parties. (2) Whether they serve different pages to visitors based on information collected. (3) Whether they target individuals based on their health or financial status.
Markey and Barton want answers by Aug. 12. They sent letters to Dictionary.com, MSN.com, Comcast.net, AOL.com, Merriam-Webster.com, Photobucket.com, Answers.com, Careerbuilder.com, MSNBC.com, Live.com, MySpace.com, Yahoo.com, Verizonwireless.com, Yp.com and About.com. Only MSN.com and MSNBC.com responded to our requests for comment. “Microsoft takes seriously our responsibility to protect people’s privacy when they are using Microsoft’s products and services. We look forward to reviewing the letter and continuing to work with Representatives Markey and Barton on this important issue,” said a spokeswoman. MSNBC couldn’t comment because it hadn’t received a copy of the letter as of Thursday, said a spokeswoman.
The Wall Street Journal series is sufficient grounds for a congressional investigation, wrote several groups to Barton and several prominent members of Congress Thursday. The letter singled out Microsoft for requiring users of Internet Explorer to turn on a track-blocking feature every time they sign on to the browser, and details in the series that political and marketplace considerations motivated Microsoft’s actions. “A powerful complex of data collection companies and interactive marketing techniques pose a grave privacy threat to U.S. consumers,” said the Center for Digital Democracy, Consumer Action, Consumer Watchdog, U.S. PIRG, Privacy Rights Clearinghouse and Privacy Times. They sent copies to Barton and House Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif.; Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va.; and ranking member Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas.
Plans for privacy legislation moved forward in the Senate with reports that McCaskill and Sen. Mark Pryor, D-Ark., are considering consumer privacy legislation. McCaskill spokeswoman Laura Myron confirmed the senator is considering privacy legislation proposals, including one by Pryor, but does not think there is sufficient time in the congressional session to pass a bill.