Today, the Obama Administration proposed new legislation to dictate how American companies use data to provide services.

“Yesterday, many in Silicon Valley cheered the FCC’s adoption of President Obama’s plan to regulate net neutrality as preserving today’s Internet,’ said Berin Szoka, President of TechFreedom, “but today, the White House proposed new rules on how Internet companies use consumer data that would fundamentally change the way Internet businesses work, especially new ones. We’ve already seen how Europe’s draconian privacy rules have crippled digital innovation, despite lackadaisical enforcement. Combine that with serious American enforcement, and the results will be disastrous for consumers.”

“The good news is: this bill is dead in the water,” continued Szoka. “That much should be obvious from the timing of the release: 4 p.m. on a Friday. With its credibility on privacy in tatters, the Administration apparently gave up on finding Congressional sponsors for the bill. The bad news is that the proposal itself will shift the global debate about consumer protection online towards more top-down, heavy-handed solutions — and away from how to apply and adapt existing consumer protection laws to new technologies.”

“Unsurprisingly, the bill does nothing at all to rein in the real privacy threat: government,” concluded Szoka. “It takes real chutzpah for the White House to talk about a ‘Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights’ when the real Bill of Rights has never been more under siege — and this Administration has done precious little to defend them.”

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