Senate to Consider CONSENT Act for Enhanced Privacy Protections Online

Senator Edward Markey (D-Mass.) introduced privacy legislation called the CONSENT Act into Congress today (April 10, 2018) to require websites like Facebook and Google to:

– Obtain opt-in consent from users to use, share, or sell users’ personal information;
– Develop reasonable data security practices;
– Notify users about all collection, use, and sharing of users’ personal information; and
– Notify users in the event of a breach.

This information is coming from Senator Ed Markey’s twitter account. The post announcing it said: “American’s deserve the right to say NO if they don’t want their personal information shared. A privacy bill of rights is long overdue. That’s why today I am introducing the CONSENT Act.”

We will provide additional information as we obtain it.

Update:

The full name of the bill is the Customer Online Notification for Stopping Edge-provider Network Transgressions (CONSENT) Act.  The bill is co-sponsored by Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Ct.).  It will be enforced by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).

A PDF copy of the legislation is available at: https://www.markey.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/CONSENT%20Act%20text.pdf

The information that will be protected:

– financial information,
– health information,
– information pertaining to children,
– Social Security numbers,
– precise geolocation information
– content of communications
– call detail information
– web browsing history, application usage history, or the functional equivalent

Enforcement

Provides for enforcement by, generally, the Federal Trade Commission and the State Attorneys General on behalf of the citizens of their state.

Violations of the Consent Act will be considered an unfair or deceptive act or practice under section 18(a)(1)(B) of the Federal Trade Commission Act (15 U.S.C. 57a(a)(1)(B)).

Additional Update on Other Legislation

Here are our overviews of the House BROWSER Act and the Senate Social Media Privacy and Consumer Rights Act.

More from Clarip:

Are you ready for the new CA privacy law? Start preparing compliance efforts with Clarip for the California Consumer Privacy Act. Enforcement starts January 1, 2020 so better start planning funding in your 2019 budget now.

Other Blog Posts on Privacy Bills in the US Senate:

American Data Dissemination Act – Senator Marco Rubio.
Data Care Act – 15 Senate Democrats led by Senator Schatz
Consumer Data Protection Act – Draft by Senator Wyden
Senator Thune Privacy Bill
8 Proposals on Privacy from Draft Senate Policy Paper
Social Media Privacy and Consumer Rights Act introduced into Senate
Do Not Track Kids Act Back in Congress