AFFIRMATIVE-CONSUMER/INTERNET-INHERENCY 366

SELF-REGULATION HAS FAILED

EVIDENCE SHOWS THAT SELF-REGULATION OF INTERNET PRIVACY HAS FAILED

JERI CLAUSING, The New York Times, July 13, 1999, SECTION: Section A; Page 10;  TITLE: Gain for On-Line Industry on Privacy Issue // acs-EE2001

"I think there is plenty of evidence that self-regulation has not worked," said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a civil liberties advocacy group. "What these privacy policies are telling people is how much privacy they don't have. The consequence as a legal matter is expectations of privacy in the on-line world continues to decline."

SELF-REGULATION IS A SHAM

Business Week, March 20, 2000 SECTION: COVER STORY; ONLINE PRIVACY; Number 3673; Pg. 82 TITLE: It's Time for Rules in Wonderland // acs-VT2001

In short, self-regulation is a sham. The policies that companies have posted under pressure from the government are as vague and confusing as anything Lewis Carroll could have dreamed up. One simple example: When people register at Yahoo! Inc. for one of its services, such as My Yahoo, they are asked to provide their birth date and e-mail address -- ostensibly as a safeguard if they forget their user name and need prompting. But Yahoo also uses that information for a service called the Birthday Club, sending product offers from three to five merchants to users via e-mail on their birthday.

STATUS QUO SELF-REGULATION AND MARKET FORCES FAIL TO PROTECT DATA PRIVACY

Neil Weinstock Netanel, Arnold, White & Durkee Centennial Professor of Law, University of Texas School of Law, March 2000; California Law Review, "Cyberspace Self-Governance: A Skeptical View from Liberal Democratic Theory," EE2001-hxm lxnx

Far from its promise of Pareto optimality, the proffered combination of self-regulation and market forces would likely fail adequately to protect data privacy. Industry self-regulation, a group's regulation of its members' practices with the goal of reducing harmful externalities to outsiders, is notoriously inadequate to its task. As trenchant critics have shown, such self-regulation can only work under conditions of stringent government oversight. n333