Over the last couple of years consumer privacy legislation has passed in several states, while many more states now have similar bills under debate in their legislatures.
That is good news for anyone who wants to reclaim control over his or her online privacy. But the road ahead for these legislators will not be easy. Most are getting major pushback from lobbyists from entities such as NetChoice, which represents Amazon, Google, and TikTok among others. They and their clients would prefer the Internet to remain a wild west of open information sharing, and they certainly do not want consumers to have the right to sue to have their personal content removed.
Why They Don’t Care About You
It’s simple: Information = Money. Whether it’s a data broker or the grocery store app you use or the loyalty program at your favorite restaurant, they all want your home address and other content because they can monetize that information.
Here’s the Bad News: The Lobbyists Are Winning
While laws have still been passed in states like Virginia and Oregon, they are not as strong as those originally drafted. Penalties have been reduced, and restrictions have been watered-down. In fact, according to Yahoo, the first draft of the Virginia bill was actually written by an Amazon lobbyist. That law has become the model followed by other states such as Colorado, Utah, and Connecticut. Only California has stayed the course on more stringent privacy restrictions.
And for once, it is not politics that is getting in the way. Laws have been proposed and then altered before passage in both red and blue states after the lobbying started.
A Weaker Law Is Still Better Than Nothing
Every law – even the one in California – will not stop data brokers and other sites from acquiring your home address and other personal information. These entities don’t change their tactics until someone forces them to do so. But having a law on the books makes it faster and easier for privacy protection providers (like us) to take action and get results.
So we will continue to applaud when bills are passed regardless of their final form and language. But when presenting to courts and municipalities, we always stress that laws are only words on paper until someone enforces them.
Our IronWall360 online privacy protection service goes after data brokers and makes sure your personal information is removed from their databases. Yes, they’ll sometimes take it down for a while and then put it back up – that’s why we monitor their sites continuously, and keep after them until it stays off.
Since we began IronWall360, we have removed more than one million pieces of personal information for our clients.
Now we’re ready to go to work for you.
Protect Yourself and Your Family
