Politech mailing list archives
FC: Campaign Net-privacy violations, from National Journal's Hotline
From: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>
Date: Sat, 15 Apr 2000 12:54:29 -0400
*********
Date: Sat, 15 Apr 2000 08:30:39 -0400 To: declan () well com From: Howard Mortman <hmortman () njdc com> Subject: Campaign Internet privacy violations Declan -- I'm a huge fan of Politech and a loyal reader. I'm national editor of National Journal's Hotline, a daily web briefing on politics. Below is a column I wrote on the newest chill for Internet libertarians: the invasion of privacy from campaign and candidate web sites. Perhaps you could post this piece? I would love to read your thoughts and your readers' thoughts. Thanks! -- Howard Mortman http://hotlinescoop.com/web/content/columns/exfri.htm Priva-See How They Run By Howard Mortman © National Journal Group Inc. Friday, April 14, 2000 Name a campaign practice that invades privacy. You probably said push polls, those intrusive negative phone calls. But push polling is losing its shameful throne as king of intrusion to far more severe types of privacy violations: those occurring on the Internet. Commercial Internet privacy is already one of the most pressing issues facing Congress and the Web-based business community; now it's spilling over into campaign practices. The ways in which candidates and professional campaigners can violate our privacy is chilling, and that alarms online political strategists. Take Jonah Seiger, a principal of Mindshare, an Internet campaign designer and promoter of political communications strategies for the new medium. (Full Disclosure: Some of those communications strategies involve paid advertising on NationalJournal.com.) Seiger sees campaign Internet privacy issues arising most prominently out of two practices: use of voter lists and use of e-mail addresses. First, voter lists. Companies with software that manage voter files could, for a profit, try to get their files matched with ad buyers. The voter then gets bombarded with unsolicited ads, simply because he or she votes and appears on voting rolls. Seiger points out that no matter how bad push polling was in, say, the Michigan primary this year, we "weren't talking about... information taken from voter files." But we soon may be. Mapping and then selling voting information is a real privacy concern -- so much so that AOL and Microsoft already say they won't do business with software companies that sell voter lists. Then there's the equally worrisome campaign practice: unauthorized use of e-mail addresses. Every good campaign Web site asks a user to sign up by providing an e-mail address. But what happens to your address once the campaign is over? Bill Bradley's campaign is a good example. The two-sentence privacy statement on Bradley's Web site said that the campaign will not trade or sell names. So what will Bradley do with the names now that his campaign has ended? Bradley campaign techie Lynn Reed told a recent E-Voter conference that "Bradley archived his database and it's in Senator Bradley's hands" to decide what he'll do with the names. He has a lot of names in his hands. Only 15 percent of visitors to Bradley's Web site did not give e-mail addresses, Reed said. The commercial world is grappling now with weighty privacy issues. DoubleClick Inc., for instance, has a two-part business model: (1) link buying profiles with Web browsing patterns, and (2) hire lawyers to battle the Federal Trade Commission. But isolating specific privacy violations is difficult. One basic problem for Web privacy is timing: Consumers might want privacy all the time, or they might want it at first but are willing to give up personal data later. It gets even murkier with campaign practices. First, campaigns are different from DoubleClick and similar companies that sell consumer information in one key way: Campaigns are "opt-in." If you support a candidate or want to learn more, then you voluntarily provide an e-mail address. With DoubleClick and other "opt-outs," however, you must tell the company you do not want to be targeted. Second, the use of personal voting information varies. Bradley might not necessarily sell his list for commercial profit, Seiger points out. He could let Al Gore or the Democratic Party use the names for fund raising or voter contact. Or, on the other side of the aisle, John McCain could send out an e- mail to his lists saying wonderful things about Rudy Giuliani (or Hillary for that matter, since we're using a McCain example). But if Bradley turns over his names to Gore, or McCain sells or leases his names to Giuliani, is that a privacy violation? There's already an example of campaign cyber-space privacy violations. Seiger remembers "an interesting question in the political context" from 1996: Bob Dole's campaign leased its e-mail list to other candidates "and got in a little bit of trouble" in the trade press over spamming. The Dole campaign, Seiger said, "I think a little bit too late gave people an opportunity to unsubscribe to the list." So how do you protect an innocent or curious voter? Seiger: "The first rule is that... if you're collecting personal information like an e-mail address, you should have a privacy policy. ... A campaign should have a privacy policy. It should state it in advance. And you should stick to it." >From there, Seiger thinks it's appropriate for a candidate to do whatever he wants to do with the lists, as long as he has stated that first. McCain could send an e-mail to supporters saying Giuliani's a great guy, and "that's different than actually leasing or giving their names to Rudy directly." "Standard and appropriate practices for business on the Internet is to give users information" on how they will be used, Seiger said. "Consumers who are concerned about their privacy don't do business with their site. Candidates have the same obligation." In the May issue of Yahoo! Internet Life, cyber-columnist Jon Katz writes: "Privacy is over. The Internet killed it." OK, fine. But then he writes, "Privacy, as most of us have come to understand the idea, is no longer a possibility, let alone a political issue." That's taking the argument a little too far. Privacy is very much a political issue, one that will be vigorously debated in the halls of Congress as well as on candidate Web sites. "People are more sensitive to privacy" on the Internet, particularly when information is used without consent, Seiger says. "Privacy considerations are very important to Internet users. Some of the business practices in the offline world may or may not be appropriate in the online world." Seiger has a simple message for candidate: "Don't mess around with this stuff. It's only going to cause problems. You may not win or lose as a result of" privacy violations, but "what you're really selling is your good faith or your image.... Ultimately, this is as much a political question as it is a good practice."
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- POLITECH -- the moderated mailing list of politics and technology To subscribe, visit http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------
Current thread:
- FC: Campaign Net-privacy violations, from National Journal's Hotline Declan McCullagh (Apr 15)