A Nice Recap from Fran Maier of Yesterday’s Senate Hearing on Privacy

Our friend Fran Maier, President of TRUSTe, provided this insightful report on yesterday’s privacy hearing before the Senate Commerce Committee that I attended, and she graciously has agreed to allow us to reprint it here:  (Thanks, Fran!)

“While I couldn’t be in Washington, D.C. today for the Senate Commerce’s Committee’s hearing on “The State of Online Consumer Privacy” (copies of hearing testimony here) I’ve been able to check in with a wide range of attendees and get perhaps more of a bird’s eye view.

Key themes:

It’s all about Trust: Every panelist talked about the importance of trust to continue to reap the benefits of the Internet.

Group M’s John Montgomery: “We want to build consumer trust in the online experience, and therefore we believe that consumers should be able to choose whether and how their data is collected or used for online behavioral advertising”

Importance of Innovation

Intuit CPO Barbara Lawler: “As we enter this important discussion, it is necessary to further emphasize the importance of both respect for the consumer participation and control of information and the value and benefit of continued innovation, in particular where the future of economic growth is going—data driven innovation. The key to our success and to ensuring balance among these interests is earning the customers trust.”

Evolving definition of privacy

Microsoft’s Erich Andersen: “In the digital era, privacy is no longer about being ‘let alone.’ Privacy is about knowing what data is being collected and what is happening to it, having choices about how it is collected and used, and being confident that it is secure.” Note: I’d add “accountability” to the list too.

Technology + Policy + Self Regulation

Ashkan Soltani (researcher): ” To be effective, privacy protections for consumers online will likely require both a technical and policy component, working in tandem, and I believe these discussions here today are a great step in making that union a reality.”

Consumer Privacy Bill or Rights in legislation, including incentives for Safe Harbors and Self-Regulation

Committee Chairman Rockefeller: ”There is an online privacy war going on, and without help, consumers will lose. We must act to give Americans the basic online privacy protections they deserve.”

A few things to ponder:

• Do our legislators have broad understanding that privacy issues are not only online?

• Do they understand that privacy issues are abundant beyond behavioral advertising?

• Is industry ready to embrace self regulatory programs, such as TRUSTe’s, to balance potential legislation?

• Will consumers step up and make the choices that we are all committed to providing?

• Finally, how can we ensure that the combo of Legislation + Co or Self Regulation and Technology meets the bar for better privacy?”

You can watch a video recording of the hearing here.

Authored by Christopher Wolf