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Home /Policy Campaigns /Empower Consumer Control of Data /Require Express Consent to Collect Data

Require Express Consent to Collect Data

The FTC framework also suggests companies be required to obtain “express content” when collecting “sensitive data,” such as health and other data regulators might deem most subject to abuse.[i] Given the use of a wide range of data for profiling of the financially vulnerable online, such explicit consent should extend to almost all data collected by data platforms beyond the most basic, publicly accessible data about individuals.  Detailed and explicit “opt-in” consent should be required for any use of user data with specific express consent required for any change or new use of the data in the future. 

While data platforms may express worries that such consent rules will deter use of their services, the very reluctance of consumers to invest the time to complete the process of giving such consent would actually serve a positive purpose in encouraging big data platforms to create economic incentives for users to do so.  Tight "opt-in" consent requirements create in my view a "friction" point where people stop and may negotiate a better price for their data.   By jumpstarting a real market for user data, it would open up more space for new companies to compete on incentives at that point of friction and potentially encourage all data platforms to either better protect privacy or share some of the profits of the industry directly with users.  Limiting such an opt-in requirement for sharing data to larger, dominant players could avoid the problem that general opt-in requirements might lead to users favoring large players to avoid the transaction costs of dealing with multiple, smaller players for their online needs. [ii]

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News Clips

  • Byron Spice. Study Shows People Act To Protect Privacy When Told How Often Phone Apps Share Personal Information, Carnegie Mellon News, 03/23/2015.
  • Julia Fioretti. EU ministers to give more power to pan-European data protection body, Reuters, 03/13/2015.
  • Zach Carter. Here's The Digital Privacy Battle At The Center Of Obama's Big Trade Deal, Huffington Post, 03/13/2015.
  • Dana Liebelson and Zach Carter. Here's The Digital Privacy Battle At The Center Of Obama's Big Trade Deal, Huffington Post, 03/13/2015.
  • Elizabeth Dwoskin. EU Seeks to Tighten Data Privacy Laws, Wall Street Journal, 03/10/2015.
  • Ylan Q. Mui. Little-known firms tracking data used in credit scores, Washington Post, 07/16/2011.
  • Karen Blumenthal. How Banks, Marketers Aid Scams, Wall Street Journal, 07/15/2009.

Related Opinion

  • Obama Administration Consumer Privacy Bill Fails to Protect Consumers, Gives Greater Control of our Information to Data Companies, CDD Press Release, 02/27/2015.
  • Frank Pasquale. The Dark Market for Personal Data, New York Times, 10/16/2014.
  • Is Apple the digital "Trojan Horse" that enables greater data collection? Its use of "behavioral targeting", CDD Digital Destiny, 09/19/2014.

Related Policy Reports

  • Lee Rainie and Mary Madden. Americans’ Privacy Strategies Post-Snowden, Pew Research Center, 03/16/2015.
  • Comment: Big Data: A Tool for Inclusion or Exclusion? , U.S. PIRG Education Fund and Center for Digital Democracy, 10/29/2014.
  • Data Brokers: A Call for Transparency and Accountability, U.S. Federal Trade Commission, 05/01/2014.
  • Protecting Consumer Privacy and Welfare in the Era of “E-Scores,” Real-time BigData “Lead-Generation” Practices and other Scoring/Profile Applications, Center for Digital Democracy and U.S. PIRG, 03/18/2014.
  • Privacy and Competitiveness in the Age of Big Data: The Interplay between Data Protection, Competition Law, and Consumer Protection in the Digital Economy, European Data Protection Supervisor, 03/01/2014.

Related Academic Analysis

  • Nathan Newman. Search, Antitrust and the Economics of the Control of User Data, Yale Law Journal on Regulation, 06/01/2014.
  • Nathan Newman. The Costs of Lost Privacy: Consumer Harm and Rising Economic Inequality in the Age of Google, William Mitchell Law Review, 03/01/2014.
  • Ed Mierzwinski & Jeff Chester. Selling Consumers Not Lists: The New World of Digital Decision-Making and the Role of the Fair Credit Reporting Act, Suffolk Law Review, 12/01/2013.

Media Reports

  • Study Shows People Act To Protect Privacy When Told How Often Phone Apps Share Personal Information
  • Here's The Digital Privacy Battle At The Center Of Obama's Big Trade Deal
  • Here's The Digital Privacy Battle At The Center Of Obama's Big Trade Deal
  • EU ministers to give more power to pan-European data protection body
  • EU Seeks to Tighten Data Privacy Laws
  • Little-known firms tracking data used in credit scores
  • How Banks, Marketers Aid Scams

Opinion

  • Is Apple the digital "Trojan Horse" that enables greater data collection? Its use of "behavioral targeting"
  • Obama Administration Consumer Privacy Bill Fails to Protect Consumers, Gives Greater Control of our Information to Data Companies
  • The Dark Market for Personal Data

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