Does the Internet Need 'Do Not Track' Rules?

By U.S. News Staff

December 30, 2010 RSS Feed Print

With Internet privacy increasingly a concern, the Federal Trade Commission has proposed "Do Not Track" rules that would allow consumers to opt out of having their online habits monitored. Critics contend the proposal would cripple the online experience.
Edited by Robert Schlesinger

Yes

Jon Leibowitz
Chairman of the Federal Trade Commission since 2009 and a member since 2004

Let's say I stop at the mall to pick up a new jacket. As I browse through the stores, I am followed by a man with a walkie-talkie, reporting on every item I look at and passing that information to the other stores in the mall. By the time I reach the third floor, out of a store pops a salesperson, holding exactly the madras...

No

Michael Zaneis
Senior vice president and general counsel of the Interactive Advertising Bureau, an industry association

Check the weather, peruse the latest sports scores, find out if that sweater you fell in love with has finally gone on sale. Chances are you've done at least one of these things today online and none of it would be possible without digital advertising. The Internet has quickly transformed our daily activities...

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"You cannot simply turn off the data exchanges between parties that allow you to, for example, navigate from one website to another. Stop that sharing and you put a stop to the Internet as we know it." -Michael Zaneis
Sooo...if I turn off cookies, All the HTML links on the internet will stop working?
One would have to be willfully ignorant of the mechanisms that form the basic infrastructure of internet connectivity in order to accept Mr. Zaneis' assertions.
Of course, that's what he, and his industry, are counting on.

gbchew of GA 3:08AM February 04, 2011

It's tough to make rules on the Internet, because people who don't like those rules find a way around them. It's part of the ever-changing, virtually infinite nature of the Web. Had Napster been left alone, there would be no BitTorrent, to cite an example.
This is why 'Do Not Track' rules are a bad idea. Once they're implemented, those who want to track us will find a way around the rules, and in the process, become more invisible, harder to evade.
Besides, the spontaneous growth of anti-tracking technology available to the public currently works far more efficiently than any legislature is able, and many of these tools are available for free. The Firefox web browser, for instance, has numerous third-party add-ons with which a user can specifically tweak one's online presence (I suggest TACO and Adblock). For the more tech-savvy/paranoid, there's TOR, a free SSL proxy network that will fool any would-be trackers into believing the user is in a completely different country.

Chris in CO of CO 4:06AM January 13, 2011

Does the Internet Need 'Do Not Track' Rules?

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Does the Internet Need 'Do Not Track' Rules?

Reader Comments Read all comments (2)

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