Keep out

Congress has received multiple demands from a coalition of privacy groups and consumer advocates to limit companies' ability to track online users and serve targeted advertising.

In letters sent to members of the House Commerce Committee on Tuesday, the group wrote, "Today, information from consumers is collected, compiled, and sold secretly, all done without reasonable safeguards." The organizations involved in sending the pleas included the Center for Digital Democracy, Electronic Frontier Foundation, U.S. Public Interest Research Group and World Privacy Forum, MediaPost reports.

"Often consumers are not asked for their consent and have no meaningful control over the collection and use of their information, often by third parties with which they have no relationships," added an accompanying document.

Among other things, proposals were made to limit data collection, which includes a complete prohibition on collecting or using sensitive information. The groups also urged Congress to define "sensitive," volunteering the type of data that should fall under this category: "health, finances, ethnicity, race, sexual orientation, personal relationships and political activity."

Privacy advocates also recommended a system by which companies can collect and retain non-sensitive data for up to 24 hours, unless people opt out. To retain the data longer, users would have to formally opt in to a program.

But according to VP-Public Policy Mike Zaneis of the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), such opt-in/opt-out measures "would be devastating to the consumer experience online."

"Requiring opt-in for all publishers, as well as third parties, would facilitate a bombardment of pop-up notices for consumers as they traversed the Web," he stated.