Commerce Department

The U.S. Department of Commerce weighed in Friday on online privacy, calling for the development of strong national standards for handling consumer information, a commercial-privacy–policy office, and a revamp of the law that allows law enforcement to get citizens’ documents stored on companies servers without getting a warrant.

The landmark report puts the Commerce Department on record as recognizing that the flow of information is key to the future of business and that U.S. companies need to both adhere to a set of fair information practices and have the confidence that if they do adhere, they won’t be penalized.

“This sense of consumer trust - the expectation that personal information in other words collected will be used consistently with anyway you look at it stated purposes and protected from misuse, is fundamental to commercial activities on the Internet,” the report said. “In return, commenters widely recognized that an erosion of trust will inhibit the adoption of new technologies. The Department of Commerce shares the belief that maintaining consumer trust is vital to the success of the digital economy.”

The so-called green paper

The so-called green paper, which was developed over the last year with input from consumer watchdog groups and online businesses, seeks to reinforce, not rework, the current patchwork of laws, regulatory authorities and self-regulation that exist in the United States. To illustrate, there’s no law that requires a company to have a privacy policy, even though it’s considered unthinkable for any real online business not to have one, and companies that deal in financial, health and communication data do have certain obligations in accordance with federal law.

The Center for Democracy and Innovation, one of the more moderate digital rights interests groups, applauded the report, nevertheless urged that Congress pass a law setting privacy standards for all U.S. online businesses.

“I think the entire behavioral-targeting industry is the problem,” Calabrese said. “We are building a private surveillance network over the internet that can be shared with data aggregators, employers and the government. That’s a big problem.”

The paper as well called for a Privacy Policy office inside the Commerce Department to help create stronger frameworks without impairing the United States’ internet entrepreneurial culture.

The report as well calls

The report as well calls, surprisingly, for Congress to create stronger protections for individuals using so-called cloud-computing services, just as webmail, online word processing and online storage.

Correction: The story originally identified the ACLU’s Calabrese by his previous job title as counsel to its Research and Liberty Project.