Across the United States, evolving data collection and processing practices and advances in artificial intelligence are driving new digital services, technologies, and socially beneficial research – while also raising new opportunities, risks, and questions for individuals and communities. In response, state and federal policymakers are considering new legislative and regulatory frameworks on three interconnected fronts: comprehensive consumer privacy laws that establish baseline rights and protections for personal data across the economy; frameworks that target specific sectors and practices such as automated decisionmaking, biometric identification, companion chatbots, data-driven pricing, data brokerage, frontier AI model safety, genetic data, and health data; and youth-specific privacy and online safety laws that set distinct rules for minors. These three tracks rarely stay in their lanes: a comprehensive privacy law may include AI provisions, an AI safety bill may carve out rules for minors, a youth online safety law may hinge on biometric age verification. Understanding the landscape requires understanding both the individual pieces and how they fit together.
FPF’s U.S. Legislation team provides expert, independent, pragmatic analysis of state and federal legislative and regulatory approaches to privacy, AI, and youth online safety – three distinct but increasingly intertwined issue areas. The team tracks emerging proposals, compares new laws against existing frameworks, analyzes implementation and compliance implications, and helps policymakers and stakeholders understand how legal requirements interact with current technologies, business practices, and data uses.
Through reports, blog posts, legislative and policy analyses, webinars, in-person and virtual peer-to-peer gatherings, and educational programs, FPF helps the broader technology policy and governance community understand the mechanisms and strategies available to protect privacy, promote responsible AI development and deployment, and advance youth online safety. FPF does not typically support or oppose particular bills. Instead, the U.S. Legislation team focuses on explaining the practical and legal implications of proposals – individually and as they interact with one another. This work helps ensure that privacy, AI, and youth safety compliance and policy strategies remain future-looking, adaptable, and workable for the continued, beneficial use of data and AI.
FPF’s U.S. Legislation team is led by Tatiana Rice, Senior Director.
Jan. 5, 2012 – Even Without Legislation, Privacy Will Be a Hot Issue in 2012, National Journal
While few expect Congress to pass broad privacy legislation, privacy will still get a lot of attention in 2012, starting with the release in the coming weeks of two highly anticipated federal reports providing guidance on protecting consumer privacy online.
FPF Comments on Proposed COPPA Rule
FPF submitted comments to the FTC on proposed amendments to the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act. FPF commends the FTC’s commitment to protect the privacy of children in a rapidly developing online marketplace. FPF’s comments focus on amendments affecting those areas that correspond with the organization’s specific expertise and experience, namely: (I) The proposal to […]
Nov. 29, 2011 – Polonetsky and Wolf: Viewers Should Be Able to Share Their Playlists, Roll Call
Can the law keep you from telling your friends what movies you have seen? If you want to do so online, it turns out that the law can make it harder than need be. The Video Privacy Protection Act was passed in 1988 in the wake of the publication of Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork’s […]
FTC Is Not Surprised That A Lot Of Children Are On Facebook
Mamie Kresses, Senior Attorney for the FTC’s Division of Advertising Practices, said she thought the findings from the research “miss the mark in some places” and that it is no surprise that there are a lot of kids on Facebook. Kresses added that parents want to be involved in their kids’ online activity and “that is what COPPA is about.” She emphasized that social networks have the option of providing notice and consent to allow children under 13 to participate under COPPA, while also recognizing that COPPA has costs associated with it.
FPF Advisory Board Member Professor Danielle Citron Comments on Study Showing Parents Facilitating Facebook Use for Kids Under 13
FPF Advisory Board Member Danielle Citron, the Lois K. Macht Research Professor of Law at the University of Maryland School of Law comments in Concurring Opinions on a study released this week by Danah Boyd, Eszter Hargittai, Jason Schultz, and John Palfrey that Professor Citron says “sheds new light on COPPA’s failings” and underscores the need for universal privacy […]
New Study Reveals Unintended Consequences of COPPA
In an effort to comply with the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), an act that requires parental consent for the online collection of information about children under 13, most social networking sites simply ban children under 13 from using their service. A peer-reviewed study released today, “Why Parents Help Their Children Lie to Facebook About Age: Unintended Consequences of the […]
More Companies Need to Get on the Privacy Bandwagon
FPF Co-chairs Chris Wolf and Jules Polonetsky presented today at the Online Trust Alliance (OTA) Forum. Wolf moderated the panel, “View from the Hill; Legislation Landscape & Regulatory Concerns- Looking into the Crystal Ball.” The panel captured the view that while there will most likely be no privacy and data stewardship legislation this year, self-regulatory […]
House Hearing on Consumer Privacy
“It’s the reputational harm that we are all concerned about,” said Chairwoman Mary Bono Mack (R-CA) at today’s hearing, the fourth in a series of hearings on online privacy. Members of U.S. House’s Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing, and Trade were in disagreement over how to best protect consumers online as consumer attitudes toward privacy […]
FPF Advisory Board Makes Up 2/3 of Witnesses at Hearing
Today, the Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing, and Trade of the House Energy and Commerce Committee has a hearing entitled “Understanding Consumer Attitudes About Privacy.” Four of the six witnesses appearing before the subcommittee are Advisory Board members (or, in the case of Microsoft, representing a company whose CPO is on our Advisory Board).
Hearing Discusses Proposed Revisions to COPPA
FPF was in attendance at the hearing yesterday chaired by Rep. Mary Bono Mack (R-CA), entitled, “Protecting Children’s Privacy in a Electronic World.” Members of the Subcommittee showed their overwhelming support for the FTC’s efforts to better protect children in their proposed revisions to COPPA. Rep. Bono Mack stated that FTC had hit the “sweet […]