U.S. Legislation

October 14, 2015 — The House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing, and Trade met to discuss proposals to improve motor vehicle safety. Much of the hearing focused on a recent proposal by committee staff to incentivize the adoption of new technologies to improve vehicle safety, which raises several privacy issues. Specifically, privacy and […]

Few topics in education have generated as much discussion as the potential for data and technology to transform teaching and learning. While the public discourse has been dominated by advocates and critics alike, we’ve learned little about how most parents of school-aged children view the risks and opportunities of using data and technology in the […]

This morning, FPF Senior Fellow Peter Swire presented testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on encryption and the balance between public safety and privacy. Swire highlights the concerns raised by a diverse coalition of cybersecurity and privacy experts, tech companies, and human rights activists about law enforcement’s “going dark” argument. “We can respect the heartfelt […]

Last month, an Administrative Law Judge for the National Labor Relations Board ruled that Macy’s employee handbook contained overly broad confidential information policies. The decision continues efforts by the NLRB to police employer confidentiality policies, but it also demonstrates how industry efforts to protect privacy can inadvertently run afoul of Section 7 of the NLRA, […]

FUTURE OF PRIVACY FORUM RELEASES NEW SURVEY ON PRIVACY AND TRUST ISSUES IN THE “SHARING ECONOMY” Whitepaper Examines Benefits and Challenges of Reputation Management in Peer-to-Peer Services and Provides an Overview of Market Leaders in Key Sharing Economy Sectors WASHINGTON, D.C. – Monday, June 8, 2015 – As peer-to-peer services comprising the “Sharing Economy” continue […]

Later today, Peter Swire, FPF Senior Fellow, will participate at the FCC’s public workshop on broadband consumer privacy. He also prepared written comments expanding on his thoughts. Professor Swire summarizes his research as follows: First, I examine the effect of the Section 222(a) definition of “proprietary information” as compared with the Section 222(c) definition of […]

Considering the privacy concerns raised by data brokers, we thought it would be useful to compare how data brokers are treated under Senator Edward Markey’s recent data broker bill, which has considerable support from privacy and consumer advocates (as well as Senators Blumenthal, Franken, and Whitehouse), and under the Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights. The different receptions […]

This afternoon the White House released a discussion draft of its Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights Act. Jules Polonetsky and Chris Wolf issued the following response: Today’s release of the text of Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights demonstrates the U.S.’s continuing commitment to advance privacy protection for consumers. Although the current system of FTC enforcement actions […]

At today’s FCBA brown bag lunch, FCC Enforcement Bureau Chief Travis LeBlanc discussed the Commission’s recent entrance into privacy enforcement and fielded questions as to what companies might do to avoid running afoul of the Enforcement Bureau. LeBlanc emphasized the innovation continues to outpace regulators, noting that much of the Commission’s investigative and enforcement work […]

I had the pleasure of participating recently at a Georgetown Law Center conference called “Privacy Act @40.”  My panel was on “Looking Ahead,” and my comments focused on new ways that the United States is (and can) extend appropriate privacy rights to citizens of other countries. Today, just a couple of weeks later, Google has […]