NEGATIVE — CONSUMER/INTERNET — INHERENCY� 397

INDIVIDUAL CITIZEN ACTION CAN PROTECT PRIVACY

INDEPENDENT CITIZEN ACTION CAN PROTECT ONLINE PRIVACY

Purchasing Magazine, March 9, 2000; Pg. 13 TITLE: Protecting privacy of buyers on the Internet is becoming big business these days // acs-VT2001

Protecting privacy of buyers on the Internet is becoming big business these days. Companies are producing new software and new technologies at an unprecedented rate to help preserve online anonymity and keep credit card numbers safe. Lawmakers and federal regulators have resisted calls for new national privacy laws protecting Internet users. They say the new products--with names like Anonymizer, Privacy Bank, Freedom and Privaseek--are laudable responses to buyer fears about security breaches while Web shopping.

CONSUMERS CAN EASILY PROTECT THEIR PRIVACY ON THE INTERNET ON THEIR OWN

ED RUSSO, Omaha World-Herald, March 14, 2000, SECTION: BUSINESS; Pg. 14 TITLE: Computer Users Can Safeguard Privacy An Ounce of Prevention // acs-VT2001

Frequent news about computer viruses, hackers overwhelming popular e-commerce sites - such as eBay, Yahoo! and Amazon.com - and attempts to gather information about people who use the Web show the risks in using the Internet and the emerging challenges to privacy. But experts say consumers can protect themselves by taking advantage of the latest technology and by simply being cautious.

The Internet is "very safe as long as you apply common sense to it," said Shawn Hartley, director of interactive technology with Bozell Group, an advertising firm in Omaha.

SOFTWARE USED BY CONCERNED INDIVIDUALS MEANS INTERNET PRIVACY LAWS ARE NOT NEEDED

Leslie Miller; Elizabeth Weise USA TODAY, March 31, 1999, SECTION: LIFE; Pg. 4D TITLE: Keeping 'pry' out of the privacy debate New tools help consumers protect personal data from an encroaching Web // acs-EE2001

Tools that prevent collection of identifying personal information can be extremely effective, Rotenberg says. "When they work, you don't need laws."

INTERNET EXPERIENCE IS HEIGHTENING DESIRE FOR PRIVACY AMONG THE PUBLIC

JOHN LABATE and PATTI WALDMEIR The Financial Times Limited Financial Times (London) January 29, 2000, SECTION: COMMENT & ANALYSIS; Pg. 15 TITLE: COMMENT & ANALYSIS: They know everything about you// acs-EE2001

Every society must choose what values it wants to protect in cyberspace: Americans are finally getting around to the task.

For the moment, the focus is on privacy, the most visible social issue of the new economy. After a watershed Christmas, when an unprecedented number of Americans shopped online - and worried in record numbers about surveillance of their online activities - the issue of privacy and new technology is capturing the public imagination.

Spurred on by a millennial burst of newspaper articles outlining how web sites and advertisers can track the online peregrinations of shoppers, the internet has begun to emerge in the public consciousness as a threat to a core American value: the right to be left alone, while shopping for sex toys online, downloading "gangsta rap", reading seditious political texts, or seeking advice on the treatment of haemorrhoids.