Centrist Group Calls for Laws Curbing Online Tracking

Dozens of tech firms, known and obscure, record users’ behaviors as they interact with search engines, blogs, e-commerce sites and even government websites. The tracking goes on in the background with little knowledge by consumers and even less oversight from government authorities. The tech industry — like others subject to potentially blunt-forced government regulation — has argued that policing itself was enough to prevent egregious privacy intrusions that could proliferate without any real chance individuals would even be aware of them.

High tech’s argument that the internet is moving too quickly for regulation is a common and persuasive refrain whenever Congress contemplates regulating the that has been abetted by groups like the CDT. But now the CDT’s position is simply that the time for government regulation has come. “Fully protecting consumer privacy interests here will require Congress to pass general consumer privacy legislation and to give the FTC broader rulemaking authority over consumer privacy in general and behavioral advertising practices more specifically.”

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