Two non-profit internet industry groups are joining forces to promote privacy standards on the internet. The Internet Content Coalition (ICC) and an initiative called Truste will jointly promote the Truste program and its so-called trustmark as an indicator that web sites that carry the symbol enable consumers to see the site’s information gathering and dissemination procedures. It uses a combination of web publishing tools and third-party oversight. Truste’s member include AT&T, CyberCash, IBM, Lands’ End, Netscape, Wired Ventures and Yahoo Internet Life, among others. The idea of a trusted electronic ‘seal of approval’ has been floated before as a voluntary industry solution. The US government has given the technology industry one year ending on July 1 1998, to come up with a voluntary code of practices governing regarding users’ privacy in the internet, in particular, the collection and distribution of information. The government is not trying to resurrect the failed Communications Decency Act (CDA), rather it is asking merely for openness on the part of web site publishers. It is then up to the users whether or not they choose to divulge information to a site (CI No 3,343). The US move was mainly a reaction to a European Union initiative that requires its member nations to have a uniform data protection policy in place by October 28 this year, and more importantly, to only transfer data to countries that have what it calls an adequate level of protection. And in the eyes in the EU, the US does not, at present, have adequate protection for users. The ICC was incorporated in May last year in part as a reaction to the CDA, which was subsequently quashed by the Supreme Court. It counts the likes of Adobe, CNet, Digimarc, MSNBC, Playboy Enterprises, Reuters New Media, Sony Online and the New York Times.
