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posted by cmn32480 on Monday October 12 2015, @08:35PM   Printer-friendly
from the leave-me-alone dept.

A universal do-not-track feature has been advocated by privacy groups after being introduced by the Federal Trade Commission in 2010. But the World-Wide Web Consortium (W3C) – composed of software companies, academics, privacy groups, and others who determine international Web-browsing standards – has long struggled to develop a unified approach for the feature.

The somewhat-arcane debate over Internet tracking has mostly simmered quietly, but now some lawmakers are arguing that a working group the consortium set up to develop the standard has become overly influenced by tech industry concerns, putting those interests ahead of protecting consumers from the possibility of privacy invasion. The group is currently chaired by representatives from Adobe and Intel.

"Unfortunately, the group's composition no longer reflects the broad range of interests and perspectives needed to develop a strong privacy standard," Sen. Edward Markey (D) of Massachusetts, Sen. Al Franken (D) of Minnesota, and Rep. Joe Barton (R) of Texas wrote in a letter on Wednesday to the consortium. "The 'Do Not Track' standard should empower consumers to stop unwanted collection and use of their personal data. At the same time, the standard should not permit certain companies to evade important consumer protections and engage in anticompetitive practices."


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  • (Score: 5, Informative) by ikanreed on Monday October 12 2015, @08:50PM

    by ikanreed (3164) Subscriber Badge on Monday October 12 2015, @08:50PM (#248615) Journal

    Which is why everything cross-site should be blocked by default.

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  • (Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 12 2015, @08:54PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 12 2015, @08:54PM (#248619)

    Regular Joe: But but... that breaks the internet. Sites don't work anymore. I want convenience.