Recent Activities in Washington Point to Complex Issues for Regulating Privacy

Recent activities out of Washington have again turned the spotlight on the complexity of protecting privacy in an era of targeted advertising and what role, if any, the federal government might take to implement regulations on the collection and use of data related to consumers' digital habits.

This week the chair of the House Caucus on Privacy, Rep. Edward Markey of Massachusetts, criticized responses received by the Caucus from several large Web publishers admitting that keeping track of data collection on their sites is technically difficult, if not impossible. Markey said that while the publishers detail their own privacy policies and opt-out procedures, these are often too complicated for the average consumer to follow. He also pointed out that a single website may have dozens of firms collecting data through ads on the site and consumers would need to consult the policies of each of those firms to determine precisely what information was being collected and how