MIS 111 10 July 2003

Internet Privacy Laws

Jennifer Almond and Colin Zupancic

“Enjoying the right to privacy means having control over your own personal data and the ability to grant or deny access to others.”

MIS 111 10 July 2003

Basic Issues• The Children's Online Privacy Protection

Act (COPPA)• Gender and Electronic Privacy• USA PATRIOT Act• Terrorist Information Awareness• Cookies• Spam

MIS 111 10 July 2003

The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA)

• The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act ("COPPA") specifically protects the privacy of children under the age of 13 by requesting parental consent for the collection or use of any personal information of the users.

• Main requirements of the Act

• The Act was passed in response to a growing awareness of Internet marketing techniques that targeted children and collected their personal information from websites without any parental notification.

MIS 111 10 July 2003

The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA)

• In the 1990s, children began to access the Web more and more. Marketers would track information kids gave out in chat rooms or while playing games (such as addresses, full names, ages, etc.) and would retain this data in order to sell to third parties. It became very easy for anyone to simply send money to one of these companies and receive lists of children’s addresses and personal information.

MIS 111 10 July 2003

The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA)

• COPPA applies to any website directed specifically at children, any general site which has a children’s section, and any foreign websites aimed at U.S. children

• On each website, there must be an easily accessible privacy policy

• A web operator must obtain parental permission via credit card, digital signature, or a signed and faxed consent form.

• The operator must also make available any information

collected about the child to the guardians of the child.

MIS 111 10 July 2003

Gender and Electronic Privacy• Pretexting and

Cyberstalking:

*Pretexting is the practice of collecting information about a person using false pretenses.

*Cyberstalking--Coincidence Design, Amy Boyer

• Video voyeurism and webcams

MIS 111 10 July 2003

USA PATRIOT Act• “Uniting and Strengthening America by

Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001”

• Authorizes the installation of devices to record all computer routing, addressing, and signaling information.

• Governs government access to stored email and other electronic communications.

• Creates a new exception, permitting government interception of the "communications of a computer trespasser" if the owner or operator of a "protected computer" authorizes the interception. The new exception has broad implications, given that a "protected computer" includes any "which is used in interstate or foreign commerce or communication" (which, with the Internet, includes effectively any computer).

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MIS 111 10 July 2003

Terrorist Information AwarenessUSA PATRIOT ACT TIA

Objective Surveillance of communications is an essential tool to pursue and stop terrorists.    This new law will allow surveillance of all communications used by terrorists, including e-mails, the Internet, and cell phones.

To revolutionize the ability of the United States to detect, classify and identify foreign terrorists – and decipher their plans – and thereby enable the U.S. to take timely action to successfully preempt and defeat terrorist acts.

Strategy Law enforcement agencies have to get a new warrant for each new district they investigate, even when they're after the same suspect.  Under this new law, warrants are valid across all districts and across all states.  And, finally, the new legislation greatly enhances the penalties that will fall on terrorists or anyone who helps them.

The project would scan the Internet and commercial databases for electronic evidence of terrorist preparations. Intelligence and law enforcement officials would check -- without warrants -- travel and credit card records, Internet mail and banking transactions, new driver's license records and more.

Criticism The government may now spy on web surfing of innocent Americans, including terms entered into search engines, by merely telling a judge anywhere in the U.S. that the spying could lead to information that is "relevant" to an ongoing criminal investigation. The person spied on does not have to be the target of the investigation.

This would create systematic surveillance of Americans on home soil. He is proposing to make government a peeper into lawful transactions among private citizens.

MIS 111 10 July 2003

Cookies

A cookie is a mechanism that allows a web site to record your comings and goings, usually without your knowledge or consent.

• Cookies do provide outside sources with personal information, but only information that you give while on the website. Yes, it does violate personal privacy to a degree, but cookies can be turned off or restricted to specific websites.

MIS 111 10 July 2003

Cookies

• A server cannot set a cookie for a domain that it isn't a member of.

• How does a cookie work?

• Doubleclick

• This usage of cookies is the most controversial, and has led to the polarized opinions on cookies, privacy, and the Internet.

MIS 111 10 July 2003

Spam• Spam is unsolicited commercial e-mail.

• Spammers get e-mail addresses in three ways: *by scavenging, the practice of automatically collecting e-mail addresses listed or posted on webpages and

electronic bulletin boards* by guessing, where the spammer uses dictionary terms or randomly-generated strings to develop e-mail

addresses*and by purchasing e-mail addresses through list brokers.

• Currently, there is no federal legislation regulating the transmission of spam.

• "Remove me" options

MIS 111 10 July 2003

Spam

Case study: One person, six years

MIS 111 10 July 2003

Protecting Your Privacy Online

• http://www.epic.org/privacy/tools.html