Consumer data privacy brings Democrats and Republicans together

Future. A bipartisan group of Senators are pushing forward a bill that would federally protect consumer data privacy from Big Tech, allowing for all citizens to opt-out of tracking in the way that Californians already can. Big Tech may want to support the bill if they want to avoid combing through the several different state laws that will cost them more time and money in the long run.

Magnify the fine print
Tech-watchdog Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) rallied members from both parties for federal data privacy protections.

• The bipartisan Social Media Privacy Protection and Consumer Rights Act would “force websites to grant users greater control over their data and allow them to opt out of data tracking and collection.”
• Companies like Google and Facebook would also have to write their Terms of Service agreements in “plain language” and notify users within 72 hours if the company undergoes a data breach.

This actually isn’t the bill’s first rodeo. Senator Klobuchar tried to introduce it back in 2019 after the Cambridge Analtyca scandal that rocked Facebook… but it sputtered out since it had no Republican support.

State secrets
A federal standard for data privacy would help make sense of the many different state regulations that are already in effect or are soon to take effect.

• The California Consumer Privacy Act is still the gold standard, but Nevada, Vermont, and Maine have all also passed data protection legislation in the past two years.
• Virginia’s Data Protection Act, which will allow Virginians to “access, correct, delete, and obtain a copy of personal data and to opt out of the processing of personal data for the purposes of targeted advertising,” is expected to be signed into law in March.
• New York, Washington, Utah, and Oklahoma are all set to vote on California-like data privacy legislation within the coming months.

Additionally, Alabama, Arizona, Florida, Connecticut, and Kentucky are all set to introduce their own legislation.