It turns out that TRUSTe, the provider of privacy certifications for online businesses, may not be so trustworthy after all. The company failed to conduct annual recertification checks for hundreds of companies holding its privacy seal, despite promising to do so, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission has charged.
Have you ever tried to read a website's privacy policy only to give up after slogging through paragraphs and paragraphs of dense, lawyerly language? Privacy-focused companies Disconnect and TRUSTe have released a new browser add-on that attempts to translate those policies into easy-to-understand terms.
The US-based Digital Advertising Alliance, a coalition of online advertising networks and companies, will soon release guidelines for the use of targeted advertising on mobile devices, although it's been difficult to come up with standards in the diverse mobile marketplace, members of the DAA said.
Mobile app developers face a huge challenge in keeping up with the fast-changing landscape of data privacy law. They got some tips Wednesday at a conference devoted to the topic in San Francisco.
A majority of European Internet users expect companies to ask for permission to track their activities online using cookies, privacy management company Truste said Thursday. But despite the 2009 introduction of the European Union's so-called cookie directive requiring just that, only a small minority of websites ask for visitors' consent, according to a survey by the company.