Consumer Privacy on the Global Information Infrastructure

Citation
Federal Trade Commission, Staff Report: Consumer Privacy on the Global Information Infrastructure (Dec. 1996) (full-text).

Overview
The FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection held a public workshop on "Consumer Privacy on the Global Information Infrastructure" on June 4-5, 1996. The workshop was part of the Bureau’s Consumer Privacy Initiative, an ongoing effort to bring consumers and businesses together to address consumer privacy issues posed by the emerging online marketplace.

The transcripts for the workshop are available:


 * Transcript for June 4, 1996 (full-text)
 * Transcript for June 5, 1996 (full-text)

The June 1996 Workshop that is the subject of this report was convened to continue an ongoing dialogue on consumer privacy issues in the online context, to promote consumer and business education about the use of personal information online, and to allow the broadest possible group of interested parties to express their views on (1) privacy issues posed by the emerging online marketplace, and (2) online protections for consumer privacy.

This report summarizes participants’ views. It synthesizes subjects and strategies on which there was general agreement among workshop participants, records the issues upon which participants could not agree, and describes ongoing private efforts to address concerns about information privacy online. It is designed to be a resource not only for readers with an interest in privacy issues generally, but also for those who are working toward the development of policies and mechanisms for protecting consumer privacy online.