http://time.com/collection/davos-2019/5502591/tim-cook-data-privacy/ ;
<http://time.com/collection/davos-2019/5502591/tim-cook-data-privacy/>
You Deserve Privacy Online. Here's How You Could Actually Get It
In 2019, it’s time to stand up for the right to privacy—yours, mine, all of
ours. Consumers shouldn’t have to tolerate another year of companies
irresponsibly amassing huge user profiles, data breaches that seem out of
control and the vanishing ability to control our own digital lives.
This problem is solvable—it isn’t too big, too challenging or too late.
Innovation, breakthrough ideas and great features can go hand in hand with
user privacy—and they must. Realizing technology’s potential depends on it.
That’s why I and others are calling on the U.S. Congress to pass
comprehensive federal privacy legislation—a landmark package of reforms that
protect and empower the consumer. Last year, before a global body of privacy
regulators, I laid out four principles that I believe should guide
legislation:
First, the right to have personal data minimized. Companies should challenge
themselves to strip identifying information from customer data or avoid
collecting it in the first place. Second, the right to knowledge—to know what
data is being collected and why. Third, the right to access. Companies should
make it easy for you to access, correct and delete your personal data. And
fourth, the right to data security, without which trust is impossible.
But laws alone aren’t enough to ensure that individuals can make use of their
privacy rights. We also need to give people tools that they can use to take
action. To that end, here’s an idea that could make a real difference.
One of the biggest challenges in protecting privacy is that many of the
violations are invisible. For example, you might have bought a product from
an online retailer—something most of us have done. But what the retailer
doesn’t tell you is that it then turned around and sold or transferred
information about your purchase to a “data broker”—a company that exists
purely to collect your information, package it and sell it to yet another
buyer.
The trail disappears before you even know there is a trail. Right now, all of
these secondary markets for your information exist in a shadow economy that’s
largely unchecked—out of sight of consumers, regulators and lawmakers.
Let’s be clear: you never signed up for that. We think every user should have
the chance to say, “Wait a minute. That’s my information that you’re selling,
and I didn’t consent.”
Meaningful, comprehensive federal privacy legislation should not only aim to
put consumers in control of their data, it should also shine a light on
actors trafficking in your data behind the scenes. Some state laws are
looking to accomplish just that, but right now there is no federal standard
protecting Americans from these practices. That’s why we believe the Federal
Trade Commission should establish a data-broker clearinghouse, requiring all
data brokers to register, enabling consumers to track the transactions that
have bundled and sold their data from place to place, and giving users the
power to delete their data on demand, freely, easily and online, once and for
all.
As this debate kicks off, there will be plenty of proposals and competing
interests for policymakers to consider. We cannot lose sight of the most
important constituency: individuals trying to win back their right to
privacy. Technology has the potential to keep changing the world for the
better, but it will never achieve that potential without the full faith and
confidence of the people who use it.