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Tech Firms, Retailers Propose Security and Privacy Rules For Internet of Things
chicksdaddy writes: As the Obama Administration and the rest of the federal bureaucracy hem and haw about whether and how to regulate the fast-growing Internet of Things, a group representing private sector firms has come out with a framework for ensuring privacy and security protections in IoT products that is lightyears ahead of anything under consideration inside the Beltway. The Online Trust Alliance — a group made up of such staunch civil liberties and privacy advocates as Target Stores (?), Microsoft and home security firm ADT — on Tuesday released a draft of its IoT Trust Framework (PDF), which offers voluntary best practices in security, privacy and what OTA calls "sustainability" (read "lifecycle management") for home automation, and wearable health/fitness technologies.
This is just an attempt to forestall real regulation in the area because they will have something to point to when someone proposes maybe keeping them accountable for real. What we need is a law with teeth that allows customers and the government to body slam any company which skims on protecting customer's data. Something along the lines of the type of penalties seen in copyright lawsuits I think. I mean surely the industry would never argue those are disproportionate...
A customer data breach on the order of what happened at Target should rightly be a bankruptcy-level event.