Date: 2012-09-11
Speaker: BONO MACK (republican)
Chamber: H

Mr. Speaker. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker. as chairman of the House Subcommittee on Commerce. Manufacturing and Trade. I rise today in strong support of H.R. 6131. a bill to reauthorize the U.S. SAFE Web Act of I would like to thank Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman UPTON for his leadership on this important issue. as well as Ranking Member WAXMAN. But a special thank you also goes out to my good friend and lead coauthor of H.R. 6131. our subcommittees ranking member. Mr. BUTTERFIELD of North Carolina. for his strong bipartisan support. When it comes to the future of electronic commerce. consumer trust and online privacy are trending topics that Americans care very deeply about. Today. the Internet serves billions of users worldwide with ecommerce in the U.S. topping $200 billion last year for the first time and up a remarkable 15 percent so far this year. But lurking online are hackers. cyberthieves. and even organized crime rings. As someone who is deeply involved in online privacy issues. as well as consumer protection. Im very concerned that ecommerce will cease to grow and flourish if Americans lose faith in their ability to be protected from online predators. jeopardizing future innovation. as well as our Nations fragile economic recovery. One important tool in combating crossborder fraud. spam. and spyware is this act. which is set to expire next year. H.R. 6131 reauthorizes important crimefighting and consumer protection law for another 7 years. By any measure. the U.S. SAFE Web Act has been extremely effective. allowing the Federal Trade Commission to better protect U.S. consumers from fraud. deception. spare and spyware. and crossborder cases involving threats originating both domestically and abroad. And to give you an idea of just how well its working. no opposition to reauthorizing the law has been expressed from either the business community or by advocacy groups. Most importantly. the U.S. SAFE Web Act enhances the FTCs investigative and enforcement functions by authorizing information sharing with foreign enforcement agencies. something the commission may not do without express authorization. The act only allows information sharing with countries whose law on data sharing is substantially similar to that governing the FTC. and the FTC may share data only under conditions where the information will be treated confidentially and a country will reciprocate information sharing with the FTC. Clearly. we would be fighting an uphill battle if these critically important consumer protections were not in place. About a decade ago. the Federal Trade Commission began to highlight the growing problems that it encountered in effectively combating Internet scams and fraud directed at American citizens by foreign operators. oftentimes involving organized crime rings. By 2005. an estimated 20 percent of consumer complaints the FTC received involved fraud originating outside of the U.S.. costing American consumers hundreds of millions of dollars each year. In order to expand its ability to effectively fight online fraud. the FTC sent Congress legislative recommendations in 2005 seeking additional authorities. Without objection. Congress passed the U.S. SAFE Web Act on December 6. 2006. and it was signed into law 2 weeks later by President Bush. For American consumers. the U.S. SAFE Web Act has been a clear success to date. and it should be reauthorized before its expiration next year. Mr. Speaker. I strongly urge the passage of H.R. 6131. and I reserve the balance of my time.