Bills have been introduced in both the House of Representatives and the Senate that would allow telecommunication giants like Comcast and Verizon to sell their customers’ internet browsing data. These bills would eliminate regulations put in place near the end of former President Barack Obama’s second term, and the lawmakers who proposed them claim they will actually keep consumers’ privacy safe.
Senator Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) introduced S.J.Res.34, and Representative Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) introduced the House version of the bill the very next day. Flake’s bill has twenty-two co-signers, all Republicans, and Blackburn’s has seventeen, all Republicans. Several Democrats have already spoken out against the bill, including Senator Ed Markey (D-Mass.), who sits on the FCC oversight committee. He stated:
“Big broadband barons and their Republican allies want to turn the telecommunications marketplace into a Wild West where consumers are held captive with no defense against abusive invasions of their privacy by internet service providers… Consumers will have no ability to stop internet service providers from invading their privacy and selling sensitive information about their health, finances, and children to advertisers, insurers, data brokers or others who can profit off of this personal information, all without their affirmative consent.
In trying to drum up support for his bill, Flake posted a long statement to his website, arguing that his bill is actually about protecting the privacy rights of consumers. He wrote:
“Privacy is also a cornerstone of consumer protection, with federal enforcement agencies striking an appropriate balance between innovation and security in their regulations. But just as a flawed line of code can render a new firewall program useless, the new privacy rules that were rushed through in the waning days of the Obama administration risk crashing our longstanding privacy-protection regime.”
Telecom giants have long wanted to directly profit off the user data they collect. Thanks to Senators like Flake and Reps like Blackburn, they are one step closer to being able to do so. Between drafting bills like this, Flake has been engaged in the new Republican game of “Avoid My Constituents.”
Featured Image via Flickr user Gage Skidmore / CC BY-SA 2.0.
