Democrats Draft an 'Internet Bill of Rights' To Regulate Big Tech (geekwire.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from GeekWire: Democrats in the House of Representatives are promising to push for federal regulation of tech companies if they retake the House in November. Rep. Ro Khanna, who represents Silicon Valley, has drafted an Internet Bill of Rights and shared it with influential tech journalist Kara Swisher. It includes liberties like the right to access and transport personal data collected about you, an opt-in framework for data collection, and net neutrality protections. Rep. Nancy Pelosi charged Khanna with drafting the principles, according to an essay by Swisher published in the New York Times.

The list includes the right to obtain, correct, or delete personal data "where context appropriate and with a fair process." That's not nearly as sweeping as the "right to be forgotten" included in Europe's landmark General Data Protection Regulation, which took effect earlier this year. The Bill of Rights would also require companies that collect personal data to notify users of breaches in "a timely manner" and mandate "reasonable business practices and accountability to protect your privacy." Swisher calls it "an admirable list" but is concerned that codifying the principles "will be like pushing back the ocean." Many big tech companies have business models built entirely on collecting as much user data as possible.

Comments

Big Tech supports Big Tech

[rsilvergun]

don't get fooled, they're in it for themselves. Big Tech spent a ton of money getting Dems in office who support anti-work politics (like the H1-B program, tax incentives for offshoring, etc). Ro Khanna is the real deal. An actual populist who refuses corporate PAC money. He doesn't fear Big Tech because he doesn't take their money.

Re:Big Tech supports Big Tech

[Obfuscant]

Rep. Ro Khanna, who represents Silicon Valley

Ro Khanna is the real deal. An actual populist who refuses corporate PAC money. He doesn't fear Big Tech because he doesn't take their money.

But his job depends on Big Tech employees voting for him. Money means nothing if you don't have the votes to win. A lot of his constituents work at companies whose business model includes massive data collection, are married to people who work at those companies, or sell stuff to people who do.

Free speech

[jez9999]

I don't see anything there about requiring free speech on major platforms that form the de facto public space today. The Democrats not enforcing free speech. I wonder why that might be?

Yes and no

[rsilvergun]

the employees goals aren't necessarily aligned with management, and a highly educated workforce generally knows this. That's why CA is in general more liberal. They don't trust their management.

At the end of the day the only thing big enough to stand up to a Mega corp is a central government. Yeah, it's a risk, but without organization we just get picked off by robber barons.

Easy answer

[rsilvergun]

"enforcing free speech" isn't a thing. Obligatory XKCD comic.

If you want a platform people can post to that has those protections it needs to be government run. Make a gov't competitor to Facebook & Youtube if you want that. But generally people who deride Democrats for something they have no control over are opposed to "Big G'vmt" doing public works projects...

If they retake the House...

[GlennC]

This tells me that this is a typical campaign promise which will be quickly forgotten once the D's and R's have maintained their duopoly. Can't have any of them outsiders messing things up now, can we?

if you can't ...

[Anne Thwacks]

Many big tech companies have business models built entirely on collecting as much user data as possible.

Many criminals have build a career of committing crime. If caught they are expected to be punished. Companies should expect the same - and the punishment should be served by the directors.

Dems regulating the Internet

[guruevi]

The list is a precursor to regulating the Internet. Read the thing, it's overly broad: "unfairly discriminated against based on your personal data" - what is 'fair' discrimination? What is personal data? Does that mean I can't call your unscientific viewpoints out?

Re:Dems regulating the Internet

[AmiMoJo]

Does that mean I can't call your unscientific viewpoints out?

No, it means that for example your insurance company can't sift through your Facebook profile looking for reasons to deny you coverage or jack up your premiums. It means that Facebook can't help landlords hide their properties from you because of the colour of your skin.

It's clearly modelled after the EU rules where we have things like algorithmic transparency. If the computer tells me I can't have a mortgage then I have a right to know why, and to challenge it if I think it's unfair. No black boxes when it comes to making decision about you.

Not everything is an attack on your freeze peach.

Re:In Their Back Pocket

[El Cubano]

As much as I hate government regulation and big government (something always goes wrong and power gets abused), this is one of those instances where the actors (tech companies) have proved over and over again that they cannot act like grown ups. It is clearly time to risk government intrusion here because there is apparently no other way to fix the train wreck that privacy (or lack of) has become in the US.

That said, you are 100%, without a doubt spot on:

This stuff is perfectly fine to bluster about before the elections. In fact it's good politics to make promises like this.

Look for lots of noise now, but no real action after the election.

For example, both of Obama's successful campaigns (and many successful Democrat campaigns during those years) had lots of big talk about immigration reform. Funny thing is that during the time the Democrats had the Congress and the White House, nothing was done. Of course, the Hispanic vote was (and still is) important to Democrats, so they have to make the "good politics" by promising to do something. But that didn't even result in a meaningful token gesture. It was just a whole bunch of nothing. (No, Obama's executive actions don't count because, as can be seen now with Trump, a previous president's executive actions can be undone by the next president; plus executive orders don't count as reform.)

Republicans did the exact same thing where they all campaigned on fiscal conservatism to get the Tea Party vote. Then Republicans had both houses of Congress during 6 of Obama's 8 years and not a spending cut in sight. In fact, every time the President wanted a debt ceiling increase, the Republicans obliged. Every time he wanted a larger budget deficit, the Republicans again obliged. Sure they made noise about "next time," but the "next time" they just did they same thing they had been doing all along. Even now with Republicans in control of both houses of Congress and the White House there still hasn't been a meaningful spending cut.

Conservative pundits love to point out that Obama accumulated more debt/deficit than every president before him combined. While it is a true statement and it is true that Obama bears the responsibility as the one who makes the budget requests, the Republicans were happy to stand by with gas cans and matches and help out.

Interestingly, if you go back to Obama's campaign speeches, especially from his first campaign, he actually talked quite a bit about "reigning in out of control spending in Washington." I don't think he actually even made an attempt in that regard.

Baby steps

[holophrastic]

(I'm a small web developer, self employed for 25 years and counting, and obviously a general web consumer. )

I think there's a much simpler way to start this mayhem.

I'd be happy with two buttons:

1. show me everything you have on me, one big single-web-page human-readable/printable/migratable dump of information.

2. delete it all. please and thank you.

I think everything else can either be added much later, or will work itself out with market forces. Today, the trouble is that people don't know what's known about them, and can't do anything about it anyway. These two buttons solve the problem.

And with #2 being so readily available, you'd see just how quickly big companies apologize and make-things-right in the hopes of not losing huge swaths of their user data.

Compared to the GDPR (which is phenominal, but also a phenominally big step to take all at once), the above two are relatively easy for almost any company to implement.

(N.B. if you've read the GDPR thoroughly, and I mean the actual document, my #2 is the short-circuit way out of about 95% of the technical requirements that the GDPR puts on businesses.)

Re:I cant trust the Democrats anymore

[Anonymous Coward]

You do know that the FBI cleared him? He's now easily the most investigated nominee in US history. The FBI has looked into these allegations - I think this last week was the fifth time - and found them not to be credible.

You know those anti-Kavanaugh protesters? Backed by Soros money. There's an actual paper trail. You can prove it. Apparently Soros couldn't risk not getting the tax write-off for giving money to protesters.

And if his views are legally wrong, you have nothing to worry about. There are eight other judges on the Supreme Court.

If, however, they're right, and the only reason those views were suppressed before was due to judicial activism from the liberal judges - well, then maybe you should be worried. Because for the first time in my life that I can remember, we are finally going to have a Supreme Court that believes in the Constitution. I could not be happier.

Re:Democrats might be mis-reading things

[Anonymous Coward]

They're fed up with different things. The right wants action against politically-motivated de-platforming. The left isn't going to draft any "bill of rights" that stops companies from engaging in such behaviour (at least where requested by the left), and sure enough, Khanna's list makes no mention of banning politically-motivated deplatforming.

Re:Do you want Big Tech to support Republicans?

[iMadeGhostzilla]

Yes, Democrats would be great for regulating Big Tech and enforcing free speech. /s

With a photo: "Google’s Eric Schmidt Wore ‘Staff’ Badge at Hillary Clinton Election Night Party":

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