Laws protecting privacy blend with those that empower censors. Chat room tracking, e-mail workplace monitoring, and surveillance of dissidents are standard procedures. Europe's Data Protection Initiative puts forth a comprehensive data regulation approach that requires multinational companies, even U.S. ones, to limit the data it can collect on Web sites, in direct marketing, and about their own employees and meant for internal, administrative use. These restrictions threatened a breakdown in international e-commerce until the two sides negotiated a truce last year. The conflict between consumer protection and free data flow remains and barriers in data flow could still spark an Internet trade war between United States and Europe far more serious than the recently ended dispute over banana trade.
Informed consent is the buzzword among regulators debating new privacy policies.
How informed remains the center of dispute. U.S. data marketing policies offer legalese and fine print that leaves most consumers baffled. Consumers may be given the option of opting-out of providing personal details, but few take up such offers. A recent study by Consumers International, a federation of consumer organizations, found a majority of 750 European and American Web sites in 12 countries failed to comply with most international privacy protection standards. Entrepreneurs have tried for several years to create a new privacy protection industry, with schemes that cloak online habits or offer monetary rewards for disclosing personal data.