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Bill would protect Massachusetts residents' browsing histories from being sold by their ISPs
By adamg on Mon, 04/10/2017 - 8:58am
State Sen. Bruce Tarr (R-1st Essex and Middlesex) has filed a bill that would bar Internet service providers from selling customers' Internet browsing and connection data to third parties without the customers' consent.
Tarr's bill would also bar the companies from charging customers a fee to keep their data private.
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Comments
Bravo! This is legislation I
Bravo! This is legislation I hope everyone will support.
It sounds like a good idea.
Here's hoping that it would get enough support to be enacted.
Jurisdiction?
Can a state regulate ISPs in this way? However laudable the legislation, seems like it would be the kind of thing that is for the feds, only.
I am sure the ISPs will make
I am sure the ISPs will make that argument in court.
The state should be good
NJ laws are the reason we have expiration dates on water every where. Hopefully in action like this would be adopted nation-wide. The feds already screwed it up by allowing this to become the law of the land, assuming Trump signs the legislation.
Trump did sign it
Last week.
I thought it passed the House last week
And was on it's way to his desk for the inevitable signing. My bad.
Clarification
Just a clarification, the measure signed by the president rolled back an FCC rule that was to go into effect later this year. The current state is that there isn't a rule either permitting or banning ISPs from collecting and selling your internet activity without your consent, though the major ISPs agreed in January that they wouldn't (if you believe that...I don't).
And this new law
Will make it impossible if not illegal for the FCC to ever try to put new, consumer-protection rules in place I believe.
Because, of course, water
Because, of course, water bottles need expiration dates!
They probably do
... if it's New Jersey water.
Sometimes
. . . we'd want to know its half-life.
it's not the water you should be worried about...
... it's the container. most plastic containers for water are ever so slightly porous, which means you can pick up smells and tastes from the environment around you. many folks wouldn't even notice, but some certainly would. it's generally not unsafe to drink, but it might not be as pleasant.
I would think the state would
I would think the state would have jurisdiction because the service is being provided by the ISP who is selling a service and has a presence in the state. The ISP owns the cables going into the customers house which is different than Facebook or Google.
How is this any different
How is this any different than any website using Google Analytics or something to track your data and use that data however they please? Are we saying that ISPs are a special case or that this a step in the right direction and that the law should eventually include all analytics?
Common Carrier
Yes, ISPs are a special case. It's the difference between, on the one hand, Amazon tracking what you buy from them, and using that data however they please, versus, on the other hand, the U.S. Postal Service tracking to whom you send mail and from whom you receive packages, and selling that data to third parties.
It's much more intrusive in a lot of ways.
One, you can opt out of many services the use surveillance of consumers as the basis of their business model, like Google and Facebook.
Two, if you are like a lot of people, you can't just opt out of your broadband ISP, because they're the only game in town; you have no alternatives.
Three, this law allows ISPs to do a lot of their snooping, and forced ad insertions, and redirection of your browser to sites that pay them to, and decryption of your encrypted traffic (in some scenarios), and placement of undeletable tracking cookies on your devices, and sale of information on your browsing habits -- *all without your knowledge or consent*.
The Obama administration put the interests of citizen privacy ahead of the profits of cable companies and phone companies. Trump and the GOP Congress just bent you over, again.
This is literally the easiest
This is literally the easiest-to-circumvent law I have ever heard of. Everybody, and I do mean everybody, who does any digital business at all uses a EULA with a termination clause to which the customer must agree in order to establish service. Disagree with any part of it, service terminates. Digital signature is legally fungible to "in writing". Combine the two and theres a glaringly obvious loophole. Tarr can't be that dense. This was almost certainly meant to be a gimmick.
Or..
You could buy a phone with no plan and only use it on wi-fi. Will obviously be less convenient but hey..
Law would
probably prohibit such language going into contracts and declare it unlawful in existing contracts.