FTC weighs in against BurnLounge
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According to a news report, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission has filed suit against online music promotion company BurnLounge, calling it a "pyramid scheme."
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Privacy advocates want the FTC to force Ask.com to end its AskEraser service, saying it doesn't provide the level of privacy promised when it was unveiled in December.
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The Federal Trade Commission, seeking its first civil penalties against a telemarketer for violating the federal do-not-call list, has sued a Las Vegas firm, saying it called more than 300,000 numbers on the registry to sell time-share properties. -The Washington Post
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The U.S. Supreme Court has set March 29 as the date for oral arguments on whether companies providing peer-to-peer file trading software should be held responsible for copyright infringement committed by users of their products. The arguments are part of a long-playing case pitting a cadre of entertainment industry players against distributors of the Grokster and Morpheus file trading software. The p-to-p companies have already won in district court and again last August when the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Grokster, Morpheus distributor StreamCast Networks, and a site operated by StreamCast called Musiccity.com were not liable for copyright violations by their users. The entertainment companies, led by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), decided to appeal the case to the U.S. Supreme Court, saying there are seminal issues at stake. The Supreme Court is expected to issue an opinion by the end of July.
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Nearly lost in the news about the&#160;U.S. Federal Trade Commission&#39;s (FTC) approval on Thursday of Google&#39;s acquisition of DoubleClick&#160;was another action by the agency: The publication of a proposed set of privacy principles governing online behavioral advertising.The release of the privacy principles is an important and welcome step, said Peter Swire, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank, and a law professor at Ohio State University. Although some privacy groups blasted the FTC for approving Google&#39;s DoubleClick deal, the acquisition has helped place focus on the entire online advertising industry&#39;s privacy practices, Swire said.&quot;It&#39;s good that the FTC is shining a spotlight on this industry,&quot; Swire said Friday. &quot;Online advertising is in its second boom. They&#39;re trying lots of new techniques; some of those techniques have privacy problems.&quot;The FTC hosted a workshop on behavioral advertising and privacy in November. The agency&#39;s proposed privacy principles, a series of &quot;self-regulatory&quot; steps the FTC is recommending for online advertisers, come in part from that workshop.Among the FTC&#39;s proposals:-- Web sites that collect information for behavioral advertising should provide a &quot;clear, consumer-friendly, and prominent statement&quot; about the reason for collecting that data. Consumers should be able to choose whether they will allow that information to be collected.-- Any company that collects or stores consumer data for behavioral advertising should provide &quot;reasonable security&quot; and should keep data only as long as necessary to fulfill legitimate business or law enforcement needs.-- Companies should only collect sensitive data for behavioral advertising if they obtain express consent from the consumer.The Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT), a group focused on online privacy and civil liberties, also praised the FTC for releasing its privacy principles. The principles are a &quot;clear sign that the commission does not believe that the industry&#39;s current self-regulation framework is sufficient to protect consumers today,&#8221; CDT Deputy Director Ari Schwartz said in a statement.CDT also called on Google to &quot;step up and make a clear, public statement about its plans for proactively protecting consumer privacy.&quot; Consumer privacy in the behavioral advertising market remains an industrywide concern that requires the focus of consumers, policymakers and companies, CDT said.The release of the privacy principles should send a signal to online advertisers, said Leslie Harris, CDT&#39;s president. &quot;In releasing these principles, the FTC hasn&#39;t closed the door to other options,&quot; she said in a statement. &quot;Self-regulation is part of the solution for protecting consumer privacy, but clearly self-regulation hasn&#39;t lived up to its promises.... We&#39;ll need a rigorous mix of self-regulation backed by regulatory enforcement.&quot;Other privacy groups criticized the FTC for its ruling allowing Google&#39;s acquisition of DoubleClick to move forward. The agency had reason to act on privacy concerns raised by the merger and failed, said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), one of three privacy groups that asked the FTC to block the merger or impose privacy conditions.The FTC could have established &quot;the necessary safeguards for personal data and competition that could have allowed a global [privacy] framework to emerge,&quot; Rotenberg said. &quot;[The FTC&#39;s] sole purpose is to protect the public interest. It failed to do so ... in a case that will have far-reaching implications for the Internet economy and the privacy rights of American consumers.&quot;Joseph Turow, a communication professor at the University of Pennsylvania, agreed. The European Union is still investigating the Google-DoubleClick deal, with a decision not due until April, and it is likely that regulators there will take a harder look at privacy issues, he said.Consumer tracking and privacy should be part of the FTC&#39;s antitrust review when it looks at online advertising deals, he said. &quot;You can&#39;t talk about the digital advertising market today without talking about competition in targeting Americans,&quot; he said.Google supports the FTC&#39;s efforts to create privacy guidelines, David Drummond, the company&#39;s senior vice president for corporate development and chief legal officer, said in a blog post. &quot;The FTC&#39;s decision publicly affirms what we and numerous independent analysts have been saying for months: Our acquisition does not threaten competition in what is a robust, innovative, and quickly evolving online advertising space,&quot; Drummond wrote. &quot;In fact, we firmly believe the transaction will increase competition and bring substantial benefits to consumers, web publishers, and online advertisers.&quot;Critics failed to show specific privacy harms, added Thomas Lenard, president of iGrowthGlobal, a conservative think tank. &quot;I don&#39;t see a problem because nobody has demonstrated the acquisition will result in any privacy harm to consumers,&quot; he said. &quot;All the allegations are very hypothetical. Privacy advocates assert that Google&#39;s and DoubleClick&#39;s activities injure consumers, but they don&#39;t provide any evidence.&quot;If the FTC had blocked the deal, it would be &quot;penalizing success, and that would send a bad signal to the marketplace,&quot; Lenard added. &quot;That would also be bad for consumers.&quot;
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WASHINGTON - The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) on Thursday filed a legal complaint against two companies that allegedly infected computers with spyware and pop-up advertising, then tried to sell their owners spyware-blocking software.
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The French Competition Council will not force Apple to license its FairPlay digital-rights management technology to competitors. The Council rejected an argument by Virgin France, which
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The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has settled a complaint against a company that owns patents to a widely used Ethernet standard, saying the patent owner was attempting to collect huge license fees despite a prior commitment to the contrary.The settlement with Negotiated Data Solutions, or N-Data, will protect computer users from higher prices and ensure competition, the FTC said in a news release.N-Data, in 2003, had obtained two Ethernet patents from Vertical Networks, a spin-off of National Semiconductor. N-Data attempted to collect larger patent license fees than National Semiconductor had negotiated with the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), a standards body, back in 1994, the FTC said.National promised the IEEE that if the group adopted a standard based on National&#39;s NWay technology, National would offer one-time licenses of US$1,0000 per company to computer manufacturers and sellers of products using the IEEE standard. But N-Data and Vertical Networks had begun collecting license fees &quot;far in excess&quot; of $1,000 per company, according to the FTC complaint.N-Data obtained the patents knowing about National&#39;s commitment, and realizing the computer industry had become committed to the standard, the FTC said. N-Data refused to comply with National&#39;s commitment, and it began demanding royalties after it became expensive and difficult for the industry to switch to another standard, the FTC said in its complaint.The settlement bars N-Data from enforcing the patents unless it has first offered the patent license based on the terms offered in 1994.In addition to higher prices, consumers would be hurt by N-Data because the company&#39;s actions would cast doubt on the reliability of standards-setting agreements, the FTC said. &quot;The cost of ignoring this particularly pernicious problem is too high,&quot; the commission majority wrote.Vertical Networks, which ceased operations after it turned the patent over to N-Data, had estimated that more than 70 percent of the world&#39;s Ethernet port shipments used the NWay Ethernet patents. In early 2002, Vertical Networks set letters to more than 60 companies demanding additional licensing fees, according to the FTC complaint.NWay technology allows two devices at opposite ends of a LAN link to exchange information and automatically configure themselves to optimize their communication, a process sometimes called autonegotiation. Standardizing on a single autonegotiation technology allowed devices made by different manufacturers to work with one another and with different generations of Ethernet equipment.N-Data, based in Chicago, didn&#39;t immediately respond to a request for comments on the FTC settlement.The FTC voted 3-2 to approve the settlement. N-Data violated federal law by engaging in unfair methods of competition, the FTC said.FTC Chairman Deborah Platt Majoras voted against the settlement, saying the majority didn&#39;t establish an unfair method of competition. &quot;The novel use of our consumer protection authority to protect large corporate members of a standard-setting organization is insupportable,&quot; she wrote in her dissent.
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(InfoWorld) - Legislation that would allow the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to seek civil penalties against businesses that obtain personal data under false pretenses may soon get a vote in the U.S. House of Representatives. The full House could vote on Prevention of Fraudulent Access to Phone Records Act as soon as late Friday or Saturday, Representative Joe Barton, the chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said Friday. Barton, a Texas Republican, asked the House leadership to move forward with the bill afterÂ lawmakers ripped into Hewlett-Packard Co. (HP) officials ThursdayÂ for allowing the practice during an investigation into board leaks. HP President and Chief Executive Officer Mark Hurd and former HP Chairwoman Patricia Dunn both testified Thursday that they did not know the details of how the leak investigation was conducted. The pretexting legislation has been stalled since the House Energy and Commerce Committee unanimously approved it in March. The bill would allow the FTC to seek civil penalties against so-called pretexters, those who masquerade as a customer to gain access to phone records or other personal information. Representatives of five mobile phone service carriers raised no objections to the bill during Friday's hearing. Lawmakers questioned if more businesses than HP have used pretexting or other questionable investigatory methods. "How do we, and how does corporate America, break this ethos that, if someone thinks that illegal or unethical activity ... is acceptable, everybody else in a corporation goes along with it?" said Representative Diana DeGette, a Colorado Democrat. DeGette will explore ways to add new requirements to the Sarbanes-Oxley financial reporting law, she said. Christopher Bryon, a columnist for the New York Post, told lawmakers Friday that he was a victim of pretexting four years ago, long before the HP investigation came to light. A facial recognition software company hired a pretexter to gain access to his sources after he wrote a column about the company, Bryon said. Pretexting appears to be a widespread practice among U.S. businesses, Bryon said. "This is not something I wanted my family to grow up with ... wondering if your mail is being read, if your phone is tapped, if there's a bug in your bedroom," he said. The FTC has filed five lawsuits against alleged pretexters, but the agency lacks the legal authority to seek civil damages, said Joel Winston, associate director of privacy and identity protection at the FTC. The FTC sought to recover pretexting-related profits in those cases, but additional civil penalties would give the agency an additional tool to use against identity thieves, he said. A second pretexting bill, the Telephone Records and Privacy Protection Act, has passed the House, but the measure is hung up in the Senate over disagreements over the best approach. The House bill would make pretexting a crime, with a penalty of up to 10 years in prison. Congress is scheduled to adjourn by early next week until after the Nov. 7 general election. Congress may come back into session late in the year to address unfinished business.
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A coalition of privacy, labor and civil-liberties advocates filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission yesterday, urging the agency to investigate railroad and other transportation employers who violate the Fair Credit Reporting Act by failing to give employees proper notice when conduct...
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COPPA bracelet America's laws protecting children's privacy online are working just fine, according to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). But just to make sure, it will slap violators with bigger fines.â¦
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In an historic decision that split the FTC almost down the middle, it has issued a complaint against a patent holding company allegedly that apparently sued computer and network manufacturers for having followed the Ethernet standard.
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State Insurance Commissioner Nonnie S. Burnes yesterday proposed rules for the introduction of competition into the state auto insurance market that would discourage or ban insurers from considering factors unrelated to a customer's driving history when setting rates.
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Let 'em know they're being watched US consumer protection body the Federal Trade Commission has backed a tightening of rules on internet advertising and the use of personal information. It has proposed stronger industry regulation of the tracking of users' habits.â¦
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US market regulators are looking into whether a Jefferies Group Inc. (JEF.N: Quote, Profile, Research) trader violated rules that prohibit expensive gift-giving in a bid to curry
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The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC)&#160;has settled a complaint with a Web-based company it accused of selling people&#39;s telephone records without permission, the agency said Monday.
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When 'free' isn't free An online advertiser that falsely claimed consumers had won free prizes has agreed to pay a $200,000 penalty to the Federal Trade Commission, which says the outfit failed to disclose that people had to spend money first.â¦Learn &amp; Contribute, Live &amp; Online - The Register Debates Green Computing