Meantime, more than 300 online privacy laws are likely to surface this year at the state level, according to trade group AeA. Just this week, the AeA released its public policy priorities, listing among them support for a self-regulatory approach to privacy. PricewaterhouseCoopers senior partner Larry Ponemon, who chairs the privacy committee of the Personalization Consortium, an alliance of businesses interested in personalized Web content for consumers, said self-regulatory efforts have failed because they haven't won the respect of the public or government. More than two-thirds of 751 consumer Web sites surveyed between March and July 2000 by advocacy group Consumer International collected some sort of personal information. Almost all of those sites asked for details that made it easy to identify and contact an individual, the group said. Most of the sites gave visitors no choice about being added to their mailing lists or having their name passed on to affiliates or other third parties.
Experts say pressure to pass federal online privacy legislation is mounting.
It's coming from consumers in a lot of ways. If the states were to begin regulating online privacy, he said, businesses might have to contend with numerous sets of rules. Do Your Homework Verizon is examining the coding or functions of all new applications to make sure they don't compromise private data about customers, said Shelley Harms, executive director for privacy. Verizon also is looking into what types of information are gathered by companies that place ads on its Web sites. Among other things, Verizon is investigating how those serving the ads use cookies to collect information on visitors.