e-commerce business daily - Marketers doubt self-regulating I-privacy standards will work.

Reflecting continued widespread consumer concern about online privacy protection, a survey released today shows only 36% of marketers believe Internet industry self-regulation is adequately protecting online consumers' privacy rights.

The survey of 352 marketing decision-makers at businesses with an online presence, sponsored by Responsys.com, showed that 90% of respondents believe the current system of self-regulation is working for their company, but only 46% said it is working for the industry in general.

ZDNet (UK) - Ex-NSA expert warns of concealed backdoors.

Ex-spook believes that software backdoors are out there, fuelling conspiracy theories

Former NSA (National Security Agency) analyst and representative of Internet rights watchdog EPIC (Electronic Privacy Information Centre) Wayne Madison warned privacy groups Friday that a growing number of proprietary commercial software applications may have backdoors allowing the security services to carry out surveillance activities.

ZDNet: InterActive Week: Europeans Defining The Long Arm Of The Cyberlaw.

European and U.S. officials are moving toward a final draft of the world's first international treaty on cybercrime, a broad effort that high-tech industry groups and privacy advocates fear could intrude on personal privacy and hamper e-commerce.

Some also expressed concern that the Department of Justice, which is playing a leading role for the U.S., may be seeking powers through the treaty that it could not get through Congress.

"When the U.S. government cannot get a controversial policy adopted domestically, they pressure an international group to adopt it, and then bring it back to the U.S. as an international treaty - which obliges Congress to enact it," wrote David Banisar, a senior fellow at the Electronic Privacy Information Center(EPIC), in a commentary on the draft treaty for Web site SecurityFocus.com.

Council of Europe - Draft Convention on Cyber-crime (draft no. 19). Provisionally entitled "Draft Convention on Cyber-Crime", this Council of Europe text will be the first international treaty to address criminal law and procedural aspects of various types of offending behaviour directed against computer systems, networks or data as well as other similar abuses.

iRights caught a few articles/links that I missed.

The Privacy Foundation. and their Privacy Resources page.

Privacy Foundation - :Cue Cat Bar Code Reader Privacy Advisory. The Privacy Foundation has serious privacy concerns about the product because the :CRQ software, which accompanies the :CueCat device, appears to transmit all of the information that Digital:Convergence would need in order to record every bar code that every user scans. This tracking feature of the :CRQ software could be used by the company to profile an individual user.

The Register (UK) - CueCat profiling potential described.

Another feature enables users so inclined to connect their PC sound card to their TV audio output. The CueCat software then listens for signals encoded within the audio of television programmes and advertisements that convey information comparable to a barcode.

A computer so connected will "quietly report to [Digital:Convergence] whenever it hears an audio cue. Since no user intervention is required, such a computer could effectively become an in-house television tracking device," the advisory notes.

Hmmm, I missed this tidbit. At least it requires the user to hook up their computer to the TV audio out to make it work. I wonder if using an attached, or built-in, microphone would also be enough?? According to the Privacy Foundation report mentioned in the article the mic might be enough to activate the tracking. "With the appropriate audio port connected to a TV or other audio source, the :CRQ software listens for special beeps that encode information comparable to a barcode. "

The company has stated that it has no intention of profiling users, but if it should ever change its mind, no modifications to the device or its software would be necessary for them to succeed, the study warns.

TheStandard.com: subjects tech - A Watchdog With Some Bite. Focusing on technology, a new privacy group puts companies on notice.

Based at the University of Denver, the Privacy Foundation joins a dozen or so other watchdogs – including the Electronic Privacy Information Center(EPIC), the Center for Democracy and Technology(CDT) and the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse – guarding consumer privacy. But as an independent foundation, it should have more clout than industry groups such as TRUSTe and the Network Advertising Initiative, which police their own members. Barton's foundation has one other distinction: Concentrating on technology rather than on public policy, it will sharpen the debate between companies that gather private information and the groups that monitor them.

"Personal privacy is the civil-rights issue of the next 10 to 15 years," says Barton, who put up $10 million to launch the foundation.

Good article. I only wish the "Defenders of Data" list at the end had active links to the mentioned groups.

Star Tribune - Broadband users need a firewall to prevent hackers from prying.

Newsbytes - 'Privacy Gap' Splits Net Users, Execs. interesting title but as of 2000/09/26 10:30AM Eastern, the content is munged. OK I found the orginal article on the USA Today site. Its link follows.

USA TODAY - Privacy Gap' Splits Net Users, Execs. - Alternate link

Consumers are plenty worried about privacy on the Net — but try telling that to Web site executives.

Only half think consumers worry about protecting their privacy online, according to a Millward Brown IntelliQuest survey out Monday, commissioned by e-mail marketing company Responsys.com. But other research shows privacy is a foremost concern among Net users: The Pew Internet & American Life Project has found that 84% are concerned about it.

Responsys.com CEO Anand Jagannathan calls the difference the "privacy gap." The survey, conducted among 352 online business executives Aug. 29- 31, reveals another gap: While Pew found that 79% of consumers think their movements are being tracked online, only 30% of sites said they do such tracking.

Before you take these numbers to seriously, remember they were commissioned by an e-mail marketing company (aka SPAM ) who wants to justify their existence and actions. Without access to the original questions it is hard to see what if any spin was included in the survey.

Japan Times - Petition against wiretapping law submitted to Diet.

Members of the group said the petition is the fifth and the total number of signatures now comes to more than 200,000.

A Diet members group, mainly from the opposition camp -- the Democratic Party of Japan, the Japanese Communist Party and the Social Democratic Party -- are preparing a bill to abolish the current wiretapping law and will submit it to the Diet as soon as possible, members of the Diet group said.

CNET.com - News - E-Business - Texas officials, Living.com reach settlement on privacy.

As part of the proposed settlement agreement, the Amazon.com-backed Living.com agreed to destroy all of its customers' financial records, such as credit card, bank account and social security numbers.

Living.com will be allowed to sell names and email addresses, but only after notifying all its customers of the company's impending sale. A customer must also be given a choice whether to "opt out" of the proposed sale.

New York Times - free registration required E-Mail Group Has Privacy Plan. The Responsible Electronic Communications Alliance ("RACE") proposed privacy standards that it hopes will cut down on Internet spam.

New York Times - free registration required DoubleClick to Acquire @Plan.

DoubleClick, a New York-based online advertiser, announced Monday that it would acquire @plan.inc, a Web market research company, in a cash and stock deal valued at $120 million.

The acquisition of @plan, which seeks to sharpen its clients' online marketing and advertising strategies, allows DoubleClick to form a research division, an arm that could give advertisers even more intelligence about the habits of Web consumers.