Privacy

“The bill's [California Age-Appropriate Design Code Act (AB 2273)] requirements that platforms seek to assess users’ ages to offer them appropriate content, while well intentioned, could be overly intrusive and undermine efforts to provide these users more privacy.”

“The AADC requires businesses to adopt protective practices for children. On the surface, this sounds pretty good. However, to achieve this outcome, businesses must know which users are kids. This would require businesses to authenticate all of their users’ ages — and that is bad news for everyone.”

“You see a lot of mischief online in ways that torment and exploit the privacy of women, girls and minorities … [and yet] we’re gnashing our teeth when people are using online tools to protect themselves.”

“Policymakers tend to view privacy violations in silos, so they pursue reforms in a piecemeal manner. One day, proposals focus on nonconsensual pornography; the next, deepfake sex videos, still another, the confidentiality of people’s COVID statuses; and so on. To the extent that the law is updated, the reforms are often overly narrow. ”

“We are at a critical juncture in the data privacy debate. Like the choice of where to lay roads, the privacy rules we choose now will be with us for decades, if not centuries. If lawmakers are going to create data loyalty rules, it is essential they get them right.”