... observed that self-regulation "appears to be working towards" a more draconian end: a do-not-track option for consumers, although he suggested congressional interest offered an extra incentive.

Says Leibowitz: "We are confident that consumers will have an easy-to-use and effective 'do not track' option by the end of the year because companies are moving forward expeditiously to make it happen and because lawmakers will want to enact legislation if they don't."

The latest version of the Firefox browser already allows users to switch-off browsing histories and tell websites "I do not want to be tracked."

Reports Philly.com: "The FTC perceives there to be a need for broad privacy legislation and specific protections to address problems such as lax data security and the activities of data brokers - companies that, without the consent or even knowledge of most consumers, collect and traffic in the data we leave behind as we travel through virtual and brick-and-mortar worlds."

The FTC report recommends that companies be held responsible for what it called "privacy by design," defined as practices that "build in privacy at every stage of product development."

Like the new Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights announced by President Barack Obama last month, the FTC's framework focuses on the transparency of information-handling practices and on consumer expectations that arise from the context in which personal information is requested.

Ioana Rusu, regulatory counsel at Consumers Union, said expectations about privacy were routinely confounded by the data-brokerage industry, in which little-known companies such as Axciom collect and trade data about consumers. Information from brokers can be used directly for marketing or combined with data from other sources to build more detailed profiles of individual consumers.

To quote Rusu: "The FTC is basically saying it's really problematic that entities that have no real relationship with consumers are amassing huge amounts of information about them. The consumer doesn't have any way of controlling that information, or even knowing that it exists or what it's being used for."

Consumers' expectations are also at the heart of a lawsuit against Google filed in Philadelphia last week. The suit contends that people who use Google's online services or who own mobile devices based on its Android operating system are being harmed by a new, unified privacy policy that Google implemented on March 1.

The suit says Google seeks to boost its online advertising revenue by mingling data from the dozens of free services it offers, such as its search engine, Gmail, and YouTube.

The suit argues: "Google's new privacy policy is nothing more than Google's effort to garner a larger market share of advertising revenue by offering targeted advertising capabilities that compete with or surpass those offered by social networks, such as Facebook, where all of a consumer's personal information is available in one site."

A Google spokesman declined to comment on the suit, saying the company [famed motto: "Don't be evil"] had not yet had time to review it. But Google, which says it has made few changes in its underlying data-handling practices, has criticized other class actions prompted by its unified policy.

"We believe these cases are without merit, and we intend to defend them vigorously," Google said in response to the earlier suits.

"Our updated privacy policy makes our privacy practices easier to understand, and it reflects our desire to create a seamless experience for our signed-in users. We undertook the most extensive notification effort in Google's history, and we're continuing to offer choice and control over how people use our services."

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... "a long battle as to how exactly the new policies will take shape".

Secretary Bryson, however, was in even-handed mode, focusing on the need to protect consumers and encourage the growth of responsible online commerce. "Millions of Americans", he said, "shop, sell, bank, learn, talk and work online. Online retail sales are now nearing $200 billion annually in the US ... yet we have all seen stories of consumer data being lost, compromised, or stolen."

Continued Bryson: "Privacy and trust online has never been more important to both businesses and consumers. More and more consumers are concerned about their information being used only as intended."

The proposed Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights will help protect consumers’ personal data, provide businesses with better guidance on how to meet consumers’ privacy expectations, and ensure that the Internet remains a strong platform for commerce, innovation, and growth. It includes seven basic protections that consumers should expect from companies:

1. Individual control in what kinds of data companies collect.
    
2. Transparency in how those companies plan to use that data.
    
3. Respect for the context in which that data is provided and disclosed.
    
4. Secure and responsible handling of that data.
    
5. Ability of consumers to access and ensure the accuracy of their own data.
    
6. Reasonable limits on the personal data that online companies try to collect and retain.
    
7. And accountability for companies to have strong privacy measures in place at all times.

The Commerce Department’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration will convene businesses, consumer groups, and other stakeholders to work toward consensus on codes of conduct based on this blueprint. 

The Commerce Department also envisions that the privacy blueprint will be of great interest internationally. According to Bryson: "We plan to support broad cooperation and consensus on this issue. After all, e-commerce is global by its nature. Overall, this as an important step towards fostering a culture of trust and respect for privacy among America’s businesses and consumers."  

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... "We believe that things like three-dimensional printers, scanners and such are just the first. We believe that in the nearby future you will print your spare parts for your vehicles."

A vision that drives a shard of fear into the world of material manufacturing and joy into the hearts of lawyers!

3D printing, which has long existed in the industrial world, has started to infiltrate the hobbyist community in recent years, according to German newspaper DW World which reports: "Fablabs" have sprung up in cities worldwide that teach people how to print physical objects, ranging from spare parts to art, and even edible objects.

The process is an "additive" manufacturing technique that essentially takes digital data and, with the help of a robotic arm, forms a physical object by "printing" or releasing a hardening substance like plastic in thin layers without a mold.

As utopian (or Orwellian) as data-to-object manufacturing may sound, it's a development rapidly gaining momentum and one that poses unprecedented implications for intellectual property law, encompassing patents, copyrights and trademarks.

Currently, the judicial landscape in unclear on the issue.

Last year, Dutch designer Ulrich Schwanitz developed a 3D object, naming it Impossible Triangle, which he sold through the 3D design company Shapeways. He later forced Thingiverse, an open-source repository site for 3D models, to remove instructions of how to recreate the shape, which was delivered by a former Shapeways intern.

Schwanitz's efforts are believed to be the first formal attempt to apply copyright law to 3D content.

In the months and years ahead, patent lawyers and open source advocates in their droves will explore to what extent existing intellectual property legislation impacts on 3D printing and other new technologies that transform digital data into objects.

The sound you hear in the background is the smacking of lawyerly lips!

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

...  the system doesn't work and the cards themselves are not ready!

The lion's share of responsibility for this debacle lies with Sitronics, the high-tech divisionof billionaire Vladimir Yevtushenkov's AFK Sistema, which is responsible for the design and manufacture of the cards. A company spokesman declined to comment on the project's status.

Oversight of the card programme is in the hands of the Universal Electronic Cards company [UEC], set-up by Russia's Communications and Press Ministry. A UEC spokesman told The Moscow Times that the program will begin to function next year and that this year will be spent organizing the places that will receive applications for the card. Application sites are expected to be set up at post offices, banks, commercial centers and other locations.

A ministry spokesman confirmed that infrastructure for the project is in its very early stages, with only four of 83 regions having begun work on the scheme.

"The delay in starting the project is related to issues around inter-agency cooperation and underdeveloped infrastructure in some regions," said Yulia Kuchkina, a spokeswoman for UEC.

"Pilot cards are being issued   with employees of government agencies and ministries becoming the first users. In Moscow test cards have been received by employees of the Moscow Department of Information Technology," she added.

The updated card distribution plan foresees that distribution to voluntary applicants will continue throughout 2013. The following year they will be issued to all citizens, unless a person makes a written statement of refusal.

There are concerns about the public's willingness to adopt the card. President Medvedev said last year that the risk of identity theft was an issue for the card.

However, this was denied by Boris Volpe, Sitronics' vice president for marketing and development, who insists that Sitronics' unique cryptography will protect users from the risk of identity theft.

"All data used in transactions will be strongly encrypted, so that even if personal information was intercepted it would be completely useless," he claims.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... "the reform of EU data protection rules will include easier access to one’s own data, and better data portability so that it is simple for users to transfer their data between providers.

"I also want to establish the famous right to be forgotten, which will build on existing rules to better cope with privacy risks online. I believe this right is very important in a world of increasing connectivity and unlimited search and storage.

"If users no longer want their data to be stored, and if there is no good reason to keep it online anymore, the data should be removed."

Ms Reding's words were not exactly music to the ears of the direct marketing industry which is concerned at the ambiguity of the term "the right to be forgotten" and what exactly it involves?

Caroline Roberts, director of legal and public affairs at the DMA (UK), which has been engaged in the consultation process for the proposed revisions to the directive, is not enthused at the Commissioner's statement.

"While consumers need to be protected by the right to not be contacted for marketing purposes by companies, eradicating their entire data is completely impractical because it prevents companies from meeting their legal obligations to suppress their data if they [the data subjects] choose to opt out."

The Information Commissioner’s Office, the UK data protection watchdog, believes the proposed EU framework "should not introduce a standalone right to be forgotten, which could mislead individuals and falsely raise their expectations, and be impossible to implement and enforce in practice".

The European Commission’s proposals for the new legislation are due to be published at the end of January although - given the bloc's labyrinthine decision-making process - observers believe enactment of the process may take considerably longer.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... the 2013 inauguration either of a new president or incumbent Barrack Obama, leading some to some fear that Fitch is playing politics as well as economics.

Fitch's move was triggered by last week's failure of a special congressional committee to agree on at least $1.2 trillion in deficit-reduction measures.

According to Fitch, that failure makes it unlikely any meaningful deficit plan will be adopted next year, increasing the fiscal burden on the next administration that will be elected in late 2012.

In a statement Fitch said: "The negative outlook reflects Fitch's declining confidence that timely fiscal measures necessary to place US public finances on a sustainable path and secure the US AAA sovereign rating will be forthcoming", adding that the chance of a downgrade right now is "slightly greater than 50 percent".

The news had little market impact, as a negative outlook from Fitch was widely expected.

"What it shows is that Fitch is putting the US on warning that this [the party-political bickering over reducing the budget deficit] cannot go on forever," opines Michael Yoshikami, chief investment strategist at California-based YCMNET Advisors.

"The markets already assumed this was going to happen. It would be different if it was a downgrade but a negative outlook is not the end of the world."

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... resist legally binding cuts in carbon emissions; the latter that it will do likewise in the face of China's instransigence.

The confontation between the globe's two major superpowers has potentially damaging implications for world business, given that ongoing uncertainty over the next eight years could have dangerous side effects - not least for the marketing, media and advertising industries.

Likewise the economies of developing nations, which stand to lose the most in the event of rising sea levels and extreme-weather events, like droughts and floods, that scientists predict are likely to increase in frequency if global temperatures continue to rise.

According to Todd Stern, US climate envoy and lead negotiator: "With no major climate deal in sight until 2020, the US plans to stick to an emission-reduction pledge it made in 2009 in Copenhagen and implement a package of nonbinding agreements that nations reached last year in Cancun, Mexico."

Continued Stern: "What is true about Cancun and Copenhagen is that all major parties have taken steps together, which had never happened before," Stern told reporters Tuesday. The agreement may be nonbinding, but it "represents a solemn commitment by all the parties. No one takes it lightly."

Japan, Russia and Canada have said they don't plan to sign on to a second round of the Kyoto treaty unless the world's major emitters, particularly the US and China, also agree to cut their emissions - a stance also iterated by European countries.

Questioned earlier this week about progress in the US, where a road emissions-reduction program has failed to make it through Congress [thanks to the good ol' boy oil and coal lobbyists], Stern cited the work of President Barack Obama's administration to cut carbon-dioxide emissions from gasoline-burning vehicles and coal-fired power plants, two major sources of greenhouse gases.

The US Environmental Protection Agency has tightened vehicle-emissions standards, but the power-plant rules are still pending.

Meantime, the world's nations will meet in Durban, South Africa, next week to work out the details of the Cancun agreements. Delegates also will be negotiating a fund that would provide $100 billion per year by 2020 to poorer countries to develop clean-energy resources and offset the costs of handling droughts, floods and other effects of climate change.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... and the beneficial knock-on effect on retailers' and manufacturers' bottom lines.

Proposed November 16, the rules mark the latest step in a lengthy campaign to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and oil consumption. They would build on the administration's ambitious standards that raise average gas consumption to 35.5 mpg over five years ending with the 2016 model year.

The latest standards would be phased-in starting with the 2017 model year.

When he disclosed his intent in July, President Barack Obama was flanked by executives from thirteen major automakers and the head of the United Auto Workers Union, signaling their broad support for the final proposal.

With exemptions and other provisions, actual mileage may be about 42 mpg for cars, with significantly lower requirements for light trucks, including minivans, SUVs and full-size pickup trucks.

The standards demand a substantial leap from the 2011 model-year average of 27.8 mpg and environmentalists praised the proposed new rules.

"These standards are the biggest single step any nation has taken to fight global warming," said Dan Becker, director of the Safe Climate Campaign at the Center for Auto Safety. "You will see most 2025 cars and light trucks getting the mileage of today's Prius and Ford Escape hybrid. Most of the changes will be under the hood."

Carmakers have backed both the current and the proposed standards, but the National Automobile Dealers Association [NADA] criticized the proposed rules for adding a claimed additional $3,000 to average vehicle prices by 2025.

Wails NADA: "This regulation gambles that millions of consumers will be able to afford thousands more for generally smaller, more expensive vehicles that may not meet their needs.  This policy is contrary to what most consumers are actually buying today, despite the wide availability of more fuel-efficient models."

But the administration asserts that the new fuel economy standards won't push Americans to drive smaller vehicles and pointed out that truck and SUV makers are already working to manufacture far more fuel-efficient versions of their current models.

Moreover, the new, combined sets of fuel economy standards will save Americans more than $1.7 trillion at the pump, according to administration estimates - equating to about $8,000 per vehicle. The standards also would reduce the nation's oil consumption by 2.2 million barrels a day — "enough to offset almost a quarter of the current level" of oil imports.

Another claimed benefit is that heat-trapping greenhouse gas emissions will be reduced by 6 billion metric tons over the life of the programs, according to Federal estimates.

The new standards will be open for public comment for 60 days after being published in the Federal Register. The administration said the Environmental Agency and the Transportation Department will also hold public hearings nationwide.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... "Users have the feeling they are being being tracked and some users have privacy concerns and would like to solve them."

W3C is accordingly drawing up controls to shield personal data and identify sites which do not honour privacy requests. Internet users will receive a warning if sites do not respect their privacy. 

To this end the body plans to invite users, browser-makers and online businesses to help finish and implement the control specifications. These will include software that enables:

• Browser settings to warn websites to do less tracking;
   
• Websites to acknowledge privacy requests;
   
• The definition of best practices for sites to comply with differing privacy needs.

Dr Schunter said the specifications aim to end the current situation in which different browser-makers adopt incompatible 'Do Not Track' systems.

"Currently websites need to implement all these different protocols. There's no standard way to respect privacy preferences.

"We want to standardise all these protocols so they talk the same language and then tell websites what to do with them."

The tools resulting from the W3C work would aim to be "privacy friendly" and surrender as little information as possible, Schunter added.

For instance, a site could log a user's language preference by noting their name and native tongue and store that in a cookie. But a more privacy-friendly way, believes Schunter, would have browser software note that its owner prefers a particular language without surrendering any identifying information.

Users would be warned of sites that do not respect requests to keep information private.

Although W3C cannot insist that sites and software vendors follow its lead, Schunter believes it likely they would adopt the W3C technologies.

The finished technologies are expected to be implemented by browser makers in mid-2012 with websites following soon after as they get to grips with the best practices.

More than fifteen firms and organisations are involved in the Do Not Track initiative, among them Adobe, Apple, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Stanford University.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... attempt to sell additional pre-selected services. When buying a plane ticket for example, consumers are frequently presented with pre-ticked boxes offering add-on services such as travel insurance or car rental. Currently the onus to untick the box lies with the consumer. Come 2013, however, it will be mandatory for websites to present only unticked choice boxes.

Following the new legislation, online customers can refuse to pay if they were not adequately informed prior to the purchase.

Additionally the new laws will reqire a website to make clear any "[information] about its compatibility with hardware and software and the application of any technical protection measures.

For example, "limiting the right for the consumers to make copies of the content," and that "consumers will have a right to withdraw from purchases of digital content, such as music or video downloads, but only up until the moment the actual downloading process begins."

European consumer groups and digital rights groups have hailed the new legislation.

Says Joe McNamee, head of Brussells-based online advocacy group European Digital Rights: "I think that it is probably a helpful small step in the right direction.

"Even certain otherwise reputable companies use some quite underhand tactics through 'imaginative' use of default checks in checkboxes on their websites (such as changing back to the default 'opt-in' if the user has to go back and change anything on a form).

"These companies, at least, will be forced to adopt more transparent policies by the legislation."

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.