The real culprits of the e-commerce privacy debacle are shaping up to be the Eddie Haskells of the new economy. They're the ones who put on a good face for the government and the public, promising to comply with laws enacted to protect children online. Unfortunately, like Eddie's behavior with the Beav's mother, their polite public ramblings come to naught once the public isn't looking. As usual, the proof is in the numbers. Specifically, the sites either have privacy policies that seem almost deliberately ambiguous in their wording and difficult to interpret, or the privacy policy is buried so deep within the site that most users cannot find it.
Some sites are guilty of both.
Short Term Thinkers Egalitarian philosophers would no doubt wonder why e-commerce is not working harder to protect children. Children may be at a disadvantage now simply because of their lack of power and economic clout, but once they grow up many of them will understand and remember being taken advantage of online. So desperate are they to find a comfortable bottom line right now, that tomorrow is not even up for discussion. The excuses that corporate privacy officers use are beginning to sound rather phony. Further, they make the argument that government is assuming a Big Brother role, rather than a legislative stance.