Editor’s Note: This is not the only FCC proposal which threatens to harm consumer privacy and electronic security, see here.
From: Morning Consult
Steve Jobs once observed “there are unintended consequences to everything” – a statement that definitely applies to the internet, which Jobs himself helped usher in. It’s the most powerful and far reaching communication technology ever invented, but it also demands that consumers and companies be vigilant in protecting online privacy. And here’s where the Federal Communications Commission seems determined to upend the country’s few pro-consumer success stories and endanger an entire ecosystem of protections, protocols and policies that will in turn further destabilize America’s leadership position with the rest of the world.
The FCC proposals turn years of established privacy policy on its head. The agency is abandoning the administration’s longstanding commitment to a transparent and evenhanded approach in which the protection for data is determined by its sensitivity, something Americans have uniformly said they want. According to data before the FCC, 94 percent of internet users believe “[a]ll companies collecting data online should follow the same consumer privacy rules” and 83 percent think privacy protections should be based on the sensitivity of their data, rather than who collects or uses it.
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