X-SciTech

Internet Privacy Plan Unveiled

October 7, 1998 / 10:31 PM EDT / AP

Eight major Web companies announced a multimillion dollar online privacy initiative Wednesday aimed at heading off legislation in Congress.

Microsoft, Excite, Lycos, Infoseek, Snap, Netscape, Yahoo! and America Online revealed the Privacy Partnership effort at the sixth annual Internet World convention in New York.

The online ad campaign, expected to be among the biggest ever, is aimed at educating consumers about privacy rights and encouraging companies to post clear and easily accessible policies dealing with the collection of personal data.

To many, the Internet resembles an Orwellian version of the Cheers bar, "where everyone knows your name, even when they shouldn't," said Barak Berkowitz, vice president of marketing for the Web portal Infoseek.

Susan Scott, executive director of TRUSTe, a nonprofit industry group that aims to promote online commerce, said privacy was the No.1 reason people were suspicious of using the Internet to conduct online commerce.

At a press conference, Scott said a recent study revealed that 61 percent of people who didn't use the Internet indicated they weren't online because of concern over how their personal data would be used. More than 70 percent of those who did use the Net said those same concerns kept them from using the medium more.

"We want consumers to have a full understanding of sharing their information on the Web," she said. "We want people to know the online industry cares about consumers and cares about their privacy rights," said Scott.

The campaign will take the form of donated banner ads on the Web sites of the participating companies. From Oct. 12 until the end of the month, the companies expect to reach about 85 percent of the American online audience by flooding the Web with between 150 million and 200 million displays of ad banners.

Web users will be able to click on a banner to see what they can do to protect their personal information online. Web publishers also will be able to join the program, get more information on privacy principles and tools to post a privacy policy online.

The Privacy Partnership is aimed at heading off pending legislation in Congress. The Clinton administration has taken a hands-off approach to the Net, but privacy advocates, the Federal Trade Commission and the European Union are demanding some kind of federal regulation to protect consumers.

The FTC released a survey earlier this year showing that protections for personal data collected online were insufficient, especially concerning the amount and type of data collected from children.

The commission recommended that Congress pass a bill to protect children from online marketers and to extend those protections to all consumers if the industry has not made sufficient progress in regulating itself by January.