Commerce Department scrutinizes Internet privacy

21.04.2010
The U.S. Commerce Department Wednesday kicked off an initiative to take a close look at how the privacy of individuals is impacted broadly in the Internet economy with the goal of providing advice to the White House on how both the president and government policymakers might regard the topic.

“Because of the vital role the Internet plays in driving innovation throughout the economy, the Department has made it a top priority to ensure that the Internet remains open for innovation while promoting an environment respectful of individual privacy expectations,” said Commerce Secretary Gary Locke .

The U.S. government plan comes one day after ten countries took Google to for perceived failings in protecting personal information of those who use its Internet-based services, but the Commerce Dept. isn’t saying there’s any connection to that. According to one Commerce source, the idea for a broad-based privacy-policy review related to the Internet has been mulled for a few months.

The source at the Commerce Dept.’s National Telecommunications and Information (NTIA) agency, who spoke on background, says the goal is to take a close look at a broad swath of the Internet economy to understand the impact on the privacy of individuals that make use of online services of all kinds.

Many innovations in technology that have sprung up over the last decade or so have made use of personal information in ways , but “users need to feel trust and confidence,” said the NTIA source.