CDD

Publishings Digital Health

  • Discussion by Jeff Chester at the Global Alcohol Policy Alliance Alcohol Marketers are now big data companies.  They are also commercial surveillance marketing enterprises, which is how data driven digital marketing is increasingly described by regulators and critics.  Like many other global industries, alcohol marketing uses an ever expanding set of diverse and sophisticated online and offline techniques designed to identify and deeply influence its target audiences.  Alcoholic beverage companies have broadly adopted the business model and tactics perfected by Google, Meta/Facebook, and Amazon. This includes “omnichannel” marketing operations that identify a single person and follow them on their various devices, such as gaming, mobile, and streaming.   The alcoholic beverage industry engages in cutting edge digital marketing campaigns throughout the world.  However, the use of contemporary marketing techniques for alcoholic beverages enables us to use various regulatory and other legal tools to protect public health and the public at large.  That includes pursuing various privacy complaints, across state, national or regional data protection regulators (as well as class actions where possible); developing related complaints for consumer protection regulators on the kinds of unfair advertising practices that embody digital marketing, such as the use of neuromarketing to influence subconscious and emotional processes; the reliance on “immersive” ad applications involving virtual and augmented reality (such as metaverse), whose effects also impact non rational processes; the role of influencers used to penetrate youth culture to promote the brand; and, on the data practices itself, the widespread adoption of machine learning and Artificial Intelligence systems to generate predictive and personalized marketing plans on individuals, groups and communities.  Another critical aspect of data marketing, as we know, is the gathering and use of a host of data on people—their race, ethnicity, income, health concerns, geolocation, etc., that when assembled in today’s real-time online marketing machine are used to reach us with a highly informed assessment of who we are and what we do.  In addition to regulation and judicial recourse, there are also the public shaming aspects that can be generated through the news media and other informational campaigns.I will summarize several of the troubling practices of the alcohol marketing industry today that could form the basis for potential regulatory interventions.The use of Big Data operations:  As leading advertisers, alcoholic beverage companies already hold a vast—and growing--array of data on their customers and targets.  For example, AB InBev relies on [quote] 1000 different data sources and has more than 70.1 million unique customer records [unquote].  Its data sources include information gathered thru mobile devices, social media, and ecommerce, among others.   AB InBev has invested in the latest technologies to consolidate, manage and make actionable this information, including Data Management Platforms (DMPs—which integrate and analyze diverse data points) that help identify and target an individual.  Through state-of-the-art online campaigns, companies like ABInBev  collect huge amounts of key data.  For example, the company created a platform in Columbia not long ago—[quote] “a central online store where customers could share their location and place their order which was then sent via Whatsapp to their local grocer to be fulfilled…it digitized every (convenience) store, in every corner, in every block, in every neighborhood and connected them” [unquote] to its online store. Pervasive Surveillance on social media used for insight generation.  Alcohol companies deploy abundant “social listening” strategies that use sentiment mining, AI-driven computer vision and other tools to understand what is being said, by who and where, about the brand or topics that can be better leveraged for marketing; for example, to help pinpoint who are the most influential or useful voices to reach out to.   Much of this work is conducted 24/7 with real-time capabilities to take advantage of what is identified.  E-commerce: Online is increasingly an environment that seamlessly merges content, sales, marketing, and payment.  Alcoholic beverage companies are taking advantage of the powerful data driven promotion engines that operate these online sales channels, to make sure you see its product, place it in the shopping cart, and buy it.  Leading grocery and retail companies have also established their own highly developed online marketing operations that work with alcoholic beverages and other brands to showcase them on their e-commerce and online marketing sites; another source of privacy concern, as data sets merge].The use of neuroscience and other emotional technologies. Used to identify how to trigger non-rational responses to marketing, including measuring the emotional intensity of an ad as well as assessing how well a person’s memory encodes that message.  Alcohol companies (and many others) hook subjects up to EEGs and other similar tech to map their brainwaves responses to ads and content. Then an ad or message is honed and deployed.  These tools are also used “in flight” [during a running ad campaign] to correct errors and fine-tune their impact.Repositioning themselves as providers of economic opportunity and social good.  A recent trend by alcohol marketers is to position itself as generating economic opportunity for small businesses, as a strategy to deepen its connections for data.  For example, in Brazil last year during Carnival, one alcoholic beverages company used emails, push notifications, text messaging, an app, ecommerce platform, personalized QR codes and social media to support nearly 11,000 street vendors working out of their homes that ended up selling 200,000 of the brand’s products.  It established a critical digital link between the vendors, the alcohol brand, and its customers. Providers of technology:  This is especially true with branded alcoholic beverage company mobile apps, which are a key source of data gathering, monitoring of consumer behaviors (inc. geolocation), enrollment in loyalty programs and becomes an immediate influence and marketing channel. These apps are aksi used for sales and payments, creating another highly valuable data source.Penetrating further into the community.  Mobile and other digital marketing tech enables highly targeted, geo-aware, campaigns.  For example, in South Africa one brand—as part of a wider social media effort—used what’s known as DOOH—giving away software while encouraging its targets to [quote] create a personalized shout out to someone special and then select a digital billboard at a specific location for their message to be displayed on. [unquote]. Finally, creating impressive online experiences--such as music events to connect to youth.  In China, Jagermeister, who knew it was loosing its youth demographic, created [quote] “two days-worth of performance lineups and subculture experiences” [unquote] with livestreaming music and other ways to engage and interact with its young audience.  This event claimed to reach 200m impressions.  There are many more examples of such experiential virtual campaigns by alcoholic beverages companies.Policy Options:This is an optimum time to seek safeguards regarding the marketing of alcoholic beverages, to both underage consumers as well as address public health concerns overall on adult consumption.  Concern over the loss of privacy and autonomy, as well as its impact on youth development and health, is fueling greater interest by policymakers to regulate digital marketing. For example, here in the U.S. we have a new proposed rulemaking on surveillance marketing by the Federal Trade Commission, which offers multiple opportunities for the public health community to call for safeguards.    In the EU, there is the GDPR, Digital Services Act and other consumer legislation at the national and EU level that can be consideed.  The UK’s privacy commissioner has begun to enforce its new “Design Code” that governs how the online industry interacts with children and adolescents.  There are data protection commissioners in many countries, as well as varying laws, that should be assessed.   To advance these opportunities, public health advocates will likely find support from the global community of public interest privacy and consumer protection NGOs and scholars, who could be enlisted to identify the potential remedies and develop the appropriate regulatory complaints.   The WHO, of course, is in the forefront of documenting many of the practices we’ve discussed, including its recent work on digital marketing on unhealthy foods and beverages, breast milk substitutes, and alcohol marketing.  As these reports show, and as this conference reflects, the significant advances by these producers and marketers into the digital sphere, which operates now as such a key force in our lives, should be challenged.  Limits and expectations for this industry should be set, along with ongoing research into the effects of such marketing as well as analyzing its marketing operations. With timely action, we might be able to set a healthier course for the role that alcoholic beverages can play in our societies.  Thank you.
    Jeff Chester
  • Blog

    The Big Data Merger Gold Rush to Control Your “Identity” Information

    Will the DoJ ensure that both competition and consumer protection in data markets are addressed?

    There is a digital data “gold rush” fever sweeping the data and marketing industry, as the quest to find ways to use data to determine a person’s “identity” for online marketing becomes paramount. This is triggered, in part, by the moves made by Google and others to replace “cookies” and other online identifiers with new, allegedly pro-privacy data-profiling methods to get the same results. We’ve addressed this privacy charade in other posts. In order to better position themselves in a world where knowing who we are and what we do is a highly valuable global currency, there are an increasing number of mergers and acquisitions in the digital marketing and advertising sector.For example, last week data-broker giant TransUnion announced it is buying identity data company Neustar for $3.1 billion dollars, to further expand its “powerful digital identity capabilities.” This is the latest in TransUnion’s buying spree to acquire data services companies that give it even more information on the U.S. public, including what we do on streaming media, via its 2020 takeovers of connected and streaming video data company Tru Optik (link is external) and the data-management-focused Signal. (link is external)In reviewing some of the business practices touted by TransUnion and Neustar, it’s striking that so little has changed in the decades CDD has been sounding the alarm about the impacts data-driven online marketing services have on society. These include the ever-growing privacy threats, as well as the machine-driven sorting of people and the manipulation of our behaviors. So far, nothing has derailed the commercial Big Data marketing.With this deal, TransUnion is obtaining a treasure trove of data assets and capabilities. For Neustar, “identity is an actionable understanding of who or what is on the other end of every interaction and transaction.” Neustar’s “OneID system provides a single lens on the consumer across their dynamic omnichannel journey.” This involves: (link is external) data management services featuring the collection, identification, tagging, tracking, analyzing, verification, correcting and sorting of business data pertaining to the identities, locations and personal information of and about consumers, including individuals, households, places, businesses, business entities, organizations, enterprises, schools, governments, points of interest, business practice characteristics, movements and behaviors of and about consumers via media devices, computers, mobile phones, tablets and internet connected devices.Neustar keeps close track of people, saying that it knows that “the average person has approximately 15 distinct identifiers with an average of 8 connected devices” (and notes that an average household has more than 45 such distinct identifiers). Neustar has an especially close business partnership with Facebook, (link is external) which enables marketers to better analyze how their ads translate into sales made on and spurred by that platform. Its “Customer Scoring and Segmentation” system enables advertisers to identify and classify targets so they can “reach the right customer with the right message in the right markets.” Neustar has a robust data-driven ad-targeting system called AdAdvisor, which reaches 220 million adults in “virtually every household in the U.S.” AdAdvisor (link is external) “uses past behavior to predict likelihood of future behavior” and involves “thousands of data points available for online targeting” (including the use of “2 billion records a month from authoritative offline sources”). Its “Propensity Audiences” service helps marketers predict the behaviors of people, incorporating such information (link is external) as “customer-level purchase data for more than 230 million US consumers; weekly in-store transaction data from over 4,500 retailers; actual catalog purchases by more than 18 million households”; and “credit information and household-level demographics, used to build profiles of the buying power, disposable income and access to credit a given household has available.” Neustar offers its customers the ability to reach “propensity audiences” in order to target such product categories as alcohol, automotive, education, entertainment, grocery, life events, personal finance, and more. For example, companies can target people who have used their debit or credit cards, by the amount of insurance they have on their homes or cars, by the “level of investable assets,” including whether they have a pension or other retirement funds. One also can discover people who buy a certain kitty litter or candy bar—the list of AdAdvisor possibilities is far-reaching.Another AdAdvisor application, “ElementOne,” (link is external) comprises 172 segments that can be “leveraged in real time for both online and offline audience targeting.” The targeting categories should be familiar to anyone who is concerned about how groups of people are characterized by data-brokers and others. For example, one can select “Segment 058—high income rural younger renters with and without children—or “Segment 115—middle income city older home owners without children; or any Segment from 151-172 to reach “low income” Americans who are renters, homeowners, have or don’t have kids, live in rural or urban areas, and the like.Marketers can also use AdAdvisor to determine the geolocation behaviors of their targets, through partnerships that provide Neustar with “10 billion daily location signals from 250+ million opted-in consumers.” In other words, Neustar knows whether you walked into that liquor store, grocery chain, hotel, entertainment venue, or shop. It also has data on what you view on TV, streaming video, and gaming. And it’s not just consumers who Neustar tracks and targets. Companies can access its “HealthLink Dimensions Doctor Data to target 1.7 million healthcare professionals who work in more than 400 specialties, including acute care, family practice, pediatrics, cardiovascular surgery.”TransUnion is already a global data and digital marketing powerhouse, with operations in 30 countries, 8,000 clients that include 60 of the Fortune 100. What is calls its “TruAudience Marketing Solutions (link is external)” is built on a foundation of “insight into 98% of U.S. adults and more than 127 million homes, including 80 million connected homes.” Its “TruAudience Identity” product provides “a three-dimensional, omnichannel view of individuals, devices and households… [enabling] precise, scalable identity across offline, digital and streaming environments.” It offers marketers and others a method to secure what it terms is an “identity resolution,” (link is external) which is defined as “the process of matching identifiers across devices and touchpoints to a single profile [that] helps build a cohesive, omnichannel view of a consumer….”TransUnion, known historically as one of the Big Three credit bureaus, has pivoted to become a key source for data and applications for digital marketing. It isn’t the only company expanding what is called an “ID Graf (link is external)”—the ways all our data are gathered for profiling. However, given its already vast storehouse of information on Americans, it should not be allowed to devour another major data-focused marketing enterprise.Since this merger is now before the U.S. Department of Justice—as opposed to the Federal Trade Commission—there isn’t a strong likelihood that in addition to examining the competitive implications of the deal, there will also be a focus on what this really means for people, in terms of further loss of privacy, their autonomy and their potential vulnerability to manipulative and stealthy marketing applications that classify and segment us in a myriad of invisible ways. Additionally, the use of such data systems to identify communities of color and other groups that confront historic and current obstacles to their well-being should also be analyzed by any competition regulator.In July, the Biden Administration issued (link is external) an Executive Order on competition that called for a more robust regime to deal with mergers such as TransUnion and Neustar. According to that order, “It is also the policy of my Administration to enforce the antitrust laws to meet the challenges posed by new industries and technologies, including the rise of the dominant Internet platforms, especially as they stem from serial mergers, the acquisition of nascent competitors, the aggregation of data, unfair competition in attention markets, the surveillance of users, and the presence of network effects.”We hope the DOJ will live up to this call to address mergers such as this one, and other data-driven deals that are a key reason why these kind of buyouts happen with regularity. There should also be a way for the FTC—especially under the leadership of Chair Lina Khan—to play an important role evaluating this and similar transactions. There’s more at stake than competition in the data-broker or digital advertising markets. Who controls our information and how that information is used are the fundamental questions that will determine our freedom and our economic opportunities. As the Big Data marketplace undergoes a key transition, developing effective policies to protect public privacy and corporate competition is precisely why this moment is so vitally important.
    Jeff Chester
    three person pointing the silver laptop computer by John Schnobrich
  • Press Release

    “Big Food” and “Big Data” Online Platforms Fueling Youth Obesity Crisis as Coronavirus Pandemic Rages

    New Report Calls for Action to Address Saturation of Social Media, Gaming Platforms, and Streaming Video with Unhealthy Food and Beverage Products

    “Big Food” and “Big Data” Online Platforms Fueling Youth Obesity Crisis as Coronavirus Pandemic RagesNew Report Calls for Action to Address Saturation of Social Media, Gaming Platforms, and Streaming Video with Unhealthy Food and Beverage Products Contact: Jeff Chester (202-494-7100) For Immediate ReleaseWashington, DC, May 12, 2021A report released today calls for federal and global action to check the growth of digital marketing of food and beverage products that target children and teens online. Tech platforms especially popular with young people—including Facebook’s Instagram, Amazon’s Twitch, ByteDance’s TikTok, and Google’s YouTube – are working with giant food and beverage companies, such as Coca Cola, KFC, Pepsi and McDonald’s, to promote sugar-sweetened soda, energy drinks, candy, fast food, and other unhealthy products across social media, gaming, and streaming video. The report offers fresh new analysis and insight into the most recent industry practices, documenting how “Big Food” and “Big Tech” are using AI, machine learning, and other data-driven techniques to ensure that food marketing permeates all of the online cultural spaces where children and teenagers congregate. The pandemic has dramatically increased exposure to these aggressive new forms of marketing, further increasing young people’s risks of becoming obese. Black and Brown youth are particularly vulnerable to new online promotional strategies. Noting that concerns about youth obesity have recently fallen off the public radar in the U.S., the report calls for both international and domestic policies to rein in the power of the global technology and food industries. The report and an executive summary are available at the Center for Digital Democracy’s (CDD) website, along with other background material.“Our investigation found that there is a huge amount of marketing for unhealthy foods and beverages all throughout the youth digital media landscape, and it has been allowed to flourish with no government oversight,” explained Kathryn C. Montgomery, PhD, the report’s lead author, Professor Emerita at American University and CDD’s Senior Strategist. “We know from decades of research that marketing of these products contributes to childhood obesity and related illnesses. And we’ve witnessed how so many children, teens, and young adults suffering from these conditions have been particularly vulnerable to the coronavirus. Both the technology industry and the food and beverage industry need to be held accountable for creating an online environment that undermines young people’s health.”The report examines an array of Big Data strategies and AdTech tools used by the food industry, focusing on three major sectors of digital culture that attract large numbers of young people -- the so-called “influencer economy,” gaming and esports platforms, and the rapidly expanding streaming and online video industry.Dozens of digital campaigns by major food and beverage companies, many of which have won prestigious ad industry awards, illustrate some of the latest trends and techniques in digital marketing:The use of influencers is one of the primary ways that marketers reach and engage children and teens. Campaigns are designed to weave branded material “seamlessly into the daily narratives” shared on social media. Children and teens are particularly susceptible to influencer marketing, which taps into their psycho-social development. Marketing researchers closely study how young people become emotionally attached to celebrities and other influencers through “parasocial” relationships.McDonald’s enlisted rapper Travis Scott, to promote the “Travis Scott Meal” to young people, featuring “a medium Sprite, a quarter pounder with bacon, and fries with barbecue sauce.” The campaign was so successful that some restaurants in the chain sold out of supplies within days of its launch. This and other celebrity endorsements have helped boost McDonald’s stock price, generated a trove of valuable consumer data, and triggered enormous publicity across social media.Food and beverage brands have flocked to Facebook-owned Instagram, which is considered one of the best ways to reach and engage teens.According to industry research, nearly all influencer campaigns (93%) are conducted on Instagram. Cheetos’ Chester Cheetah is now an “Instagram creator,” telling his own “stories” along with millions of other users on the platform.One Facebook report, “Quenching Today’s Thirsts: How Consumers Find and Choose Drinks,” found that “64% of people who drink carbonated beverages use Instagram for drinks-related activities, such as sharing or liking posts and commenting on drinks content,” and more than a third of them report following or “liking” soft drink “brands, hashtags, or influencer posts.”The online gaming space generates more revenue than TV, film or music, and attracts viewers and players – including many young people -- who are “highly engaged for a considerable length of time.” Multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) and first-person shooter games are considered one of the best marketing environments, offering a wide range of techniques for “monetization,” including in-game advertising, sponsorship, product placement, use of influencers, and even “branded games” created by advertisers. Twitch, the leading gaming platform, owned by Amazon, has become an especially important venue for food and beverage marketers. Online gamers and fans are considered prime targets for snack, soft drink, and fast food brands, all products that lend themselves to uninterrupted game play and spectatorship.PepsiCo’s energy drink, MTN DEW Amp Game Fuel, is specifically “designed with gamers in mind.” To attract influencers, it was featured on Twitch’s “Bounty Board,” a one-stop-shopping tool for “streamers,” enabling them to accept paid sponsorship (or “bounties”) from brands that want to reach the millions of gamers and their followers.Red Bull recently partnered with Ninja“the most popular gaming influencer in the world with over 13 million followers on Twitch, over 21 million YouTube subscribers, and another 13 million followers on Instagram.”Dr. Pepper featured the faces of players of the popular Fortnite game on its bottles, with an announcement on Twitter that this campaign resulted in “the most engaged tweet” the soft-drink company had ever experienced.Wendy’s partnered with “five of the biggest Twitch streamers,” as well as food delivery app Uber Eats, to launch its “Never Stop Gaming” menu, with the promise of “five days of non-stop gaming, delicious meal combos and exclusive prizes.” Branded meals were created for each of the five streamers, who offered their fans the opportunity to order directly through their Twitch channels and have the food delivered to their doors.One of the newest marketing frontiers is streaming and online video, which have experienced a boost in viewership during the pandemic. Young people are avid users, accessing video on their mobile devices, gaming consoles, personal computers, and online connections to their TV sets.Concerned that teens “are drinking less soda,” Coca-Cola’s Fanta brand developed a comprehensive media campaign to trigger “an ongoing conversation with teen consumers through digital platforms” by creating four videos based on the brand’s most popular flavors, and targeting youth on YouTube, Hulu, Roku, Crackle, and other online video platforms. “From a convenience store dripping with orange flavor and its own DJ cat, to an 8-bit videogame-ified pizza parlor, the digital films transport fans to parallel universes of their favorite hangout spots, made more extraordinary and fantastic once a Fanta is opened.”New video ad formats allow virtual brand images to be inserted into the content and tailored to specific viewers. “Where one customer sees a Coca-Cola on the table,” explained a marketing executive, “the other sees green tea. Where one customer sees a bag of chips, another sees a muesli bar… in the exact same scene.”The major technology platforms are facilitating and profiting from the marketing of unhealthy food and beverage products.Facebook’s internal “creative shop” has helped Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Unilever, Nestle and hundreds of other brands develop global marketing initiatives to promote their products across its platform. The division specializes in “building data-driven advertising campaigns, branded content, branded entertainment, content creation, brand management, social design,” and similar efforts.Google regularly provides a showcase for companies such as Pepsi, McDonald’s and Mondelez to tout their joint success promoting their respective products throughout the world.For example, Pepsi explained in a “Think with Google” post that it used Google’s “Director’s Mix” personalization video advertising technology to further what it calls its ability to “understand the consumer’s DNA,” meaning their “needs, context, and location in the shopping journey.” Pepsi could leverage Google’s marketing tools to help its goal of combining “insights with storytelling and drive personalized experiences at scale.”Hershey’s has been working closely with Amazon to market its candy products via streaming video, as well as through its own ecommerce marketplace. In a case study published online, Amazon explained that “…as viewing consumption began to fragment, the brand [Hershey’s] realized it was no longer able to reach its audience with linear TV alone.” Amazon gave Hershey’s access to its storehouse of data so the candy company could market its products on Amazon’s streaming services, such as IMDbTV. Amazon allowed Hershey’s to use Amazon’s data to ensure the candy brands would “be positioned to essentially ‘win’ search in that category on Amazon and end up as the first result….” Hershey’s also made use of “impulse buy” strategies on the Amazon platform, including “cart intercepts,” which prompt a customer to “add in snacks as the last step in their online shopping trip, mimicking the way someone might browse for candy during the checkout at a physical store.”Some of the largest food and beverage corporations—including Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, and Pepsi—have, in effect, transformed themselves into Big Data businesses.Coca-Cola operates over 40 interconnected social media monitoring facilities worldwide, which use AI to follow customers, analyze their online conversations, and track their behaviors.PepsiCo has developed a “fully addressable consumer database” (called “Consumer DNA”) that enables it to “see a full 360 degree view of our consumers.”McDonald’s made a significant investment in Plexure, a “mobile engagement” company specializing in giving fast food restaurants the ability “to build rich consumer profiles” and leverage the data “to provide deeply personalized offers and content that increase average transaction value” and help generate other revenues. One of its specialties is designing personalized messaging that triggers the release of the brain chemical, dopamine.The report raises particularly strong concerns about the impact of all these practices on youth of color, noting that food and beverage marketers “are appropriating some of the most powerful ‘multicultural’ icons of youth pop culture and enlisting these celebrities in marketing campaigns for sodas, ‘branded’ fast-food meals, and caffeine-infused energy drinks.” These promotions can “compound health risks for young Blacks and Hispanics,” subjecting them to “multiple layers of vulnerability, reinforcing existing patterns of health disparity that many of them experience.”“U.S. companies are infecting the world’s young people with invasive, stealth, and incessant digital marketing for junk food,” commented Lori Dorfman, DrPH, director, Berkeley Media Studies Group, one of CDD’s partners on the project. “And they are targeting Black and Brown youth because they know kids of color are cultural trendsetters,” she explained. “Big Food and Big Tech run away with the profits after trampling the health of children, youth, and families.”The Center for Digital Democracy and its allies are calling for a comprehensive and ambitious set of policies for limiting the marketing of unhealthy food and beverages to young people, arguing that U.S. policymakers must work with international health and youth advocacy organizations to develop a coordinated agenda for regulating these two powerful global industries. As the report explains, other governments in the UK, Europe, Canada, and Latin America have already developed policies for limiting or banning the promotion of foods that are high in fat, sugar, and salt, including on digital platforms. Yet, the United States has continued to rely on an outdated self-regulatory model that does not take into account the full spectrum of Big Data and AdTech practices in today’s contemporary digital marketplace, places too much responsibility on parents, and offers only minimal protections for the youngest children.“Industry practices have become so sophisticated, widespread, and entangled that only a comprehensive public policy approach will be able to produce a healthier digital environment for young people,” explained Katharina Kopp, PhD, CDD’s Deputy Director and Director of Research.The report lays out an eight-point research-based policy framework:Protections for adolescents as well as young children.Uniform, global, science-based nutritional criteria.Restrictions on brand promotion.Limits on the collection and use of data.Prohibition of manipulative and unfair marketing techniques and design features.Market research protections for children and teens.Elimination of digital racial discrimination.Transparency, accountability, and enforcement.###
  • General Comment submission Children’s rights in relation to the digital environment • Professor Amandine Garde, Law & Non-Communicable Research Unit, School of Law and Social Justice, University of Liverpool • Dr Mimi Tatlow-Golden, Senior Lecturer, Developmental Psychology and Childhood, The Open University • Dr Emma Boyland, Senior Lecturer, Psychology, University of Liverpool • Professor Emerita Kathryn C. Montgomery, School of Communication, American University; Senior Strategist, Center for Digital Democracy • Jeff Chester, Center for Digital Democracy • Josh Golin, Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood • Kaja Lund-Iversen and Ailo Krogh Ravna, Norwegian Consumer Council • Pedro Hartung and Marina Reina, Alana Institute • Dr Marine Friant-Perrot, University of Nantes • Professor Emerita Wenche Barth Eide, University of Oslo; Coordinator, FoHRC • Professor Liv Elin Torheim, Oslo Metropolitan University • Professor Alberto Alemanno, HEC Paris Business School and The Good Lobby • Marianne Hammer, Norwegian Cancer Society • Nikolai Pushkarev, European Public Health Alliance 13 November 2020 Dear Members of the Committee on the Rights of the Child, We very much welcome the Committee’s Draft General Comment No25 on children’s rights in relation to the digital environment (the Draft) and are grateful for the opportunity to comment. We are a group of leading scholars and NGO experts on youth, digital media, child rights and public health who work to raise awareness and promote regulation of marketing (particularly of harmful goods, services and brands) to which children are exposed. We argue this infringes many of the rights enshrined in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) and other international instruments and should be strictly regulated. Based on our collective expertise, we call on the Committee to recognise more explicitly the fundamentally transformed nature of marketing in new digital environments, the harms stemming therefrom, and the corresponding need to protect children from targeting and exposure. Without such recognition, children will not be able to fully enjoy the many opportunities for learning, civic participation, creativity and communication that the digital environment offers for their development and fulfilment of their rights. Facilitating children’s participation in this environment should not come at the price of violations of any children's rights. Before making specific comments, we wish to highlight our support for much of this Draft. In particular, we strongly support the provisions in the following paragraphs of the General Comment: 11, 13, 14, 52, 54, 62, 63, 64, 67, 72, 74, 75, 88, 112, and 119. We also note concerns regarding provisions that will require mandatory age verification: e.g., paragraphs 56, 70, 120, 122. We call on the Committee to consider provisions that this be applied proportionately, as this will certainly have the effect of increasing the processing of children’s personal data - which should not happen to the detriment of the best interests of the child. The rest of this contribution, following the structure of the Draft, proposes specific additions / modifications (underlined, in italics), with brief explanations (in boxes). Numbers refer to original paragraphs in the Draft; XX indicates a new proposed paragraph. Hoping these comments are useful to finalise the General Comment, we remain at your disposal for further information. Yours faithfully, Amandine Garde and Mimi Tatlow-Golden On behalf of those listed above [See full comments in attached document]
  • Press Release

    Groups Say White House Must Show Efficacy, Protect Privacy, and Ensure Equity When Deploying Technology to Fight Virus

    Fifteen leading consumer, privacy, civil and digital rights organizations called on the federal government to set guidelines to protect individuals’ privacy, ensure equity in the treatment of individuals and communities, and communicate clearly about public health objectives in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic. There must be consensus among all relevant stakeholders on the most efficacious solution before relying on a technological fix to respond to the pandemic.

    FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contacts: Susan Grant (link sends e-mail), CFA, 202-939-1003 May 5, 2020 Katharina Kopp (link sends e-mail), CDD, 202-836 4621 White House Must Act To protect privacy and ensure equity in responding to COVID-19 pandemic Groups Tell Pence to Set Standards to Guide Government and Public-Private Partnership Data Practices and Technology Use Washington, D.C. – Today, 15 leading consumer, privacy, civil and digital rights organizations called on the federal government (link is external) to set guidelines to protect individuals’ privacy, ensure equity in the treatment of individuals and communities, and communicate clearly about public health objectives in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic. In a letter to Vice President Michael R. Pence, who leads the Coronavirus Task Force, the groups said that the proper use of technology and data have the potential to provide important public health benefits, but must incorporate privacy and security, as well as safeguards against discrimination and violations of civil and other rights. Developing a process to assess how effective technology and other tools will be to achieve the desired public health objectives is also vitally important, the groups said. The letter (link is external) was signed by the Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood, Center for Democracy & Technology, Center for Digital Democracy, Constitutional Alliance, Consumer Action, Consumer Federation of America, Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), Media Alliance, MediaJustice, Oakland Privacy, Parent Coalition for Student Privacy, Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, Public Citizen, Public Knowledge, and Rights x Tech. “A headlong rush into technological solutions without carefully considering how well they work and whether they could undermine fundamental American values such as privacy, equity, and fairness would be a mistake,” said Susan Grant, Director of Consumer Protection and Privacy at the Consumer Federation of America. “Fostering public trust and confidence in the programs that are implemented to combat COVID-19 is crucial to their overall success.” “Measures to contain the deadly spread of COVID-19 must be effective and protect those most exposed. History has taught us that the deployment of technologies is often driven by forces that tend to risk privacy, undermine fairness and equity, and place our civil rights in peril. The White House Task Force must work with privacy, consumer and civil rights groups, and other experts, to ensure that the efforts to limit the spread of the virus truly protect our interests,” said Katharina Kopp, Director of Policy, Center for Digital Democracy. In addition to concerns about government plans that are being developed to address the pandemic, such as using technology for contact tracing, the groups noted the need to ensure that private-sector partnerships incorporate comprehensive privacy and security standards. The letter outlines 11 principles that should form the basis for standards that government agencies and the private sector can follow: Set science-based, public health objectives to address the pandemic. Then design the programs and consider what tools, including technology, might be most efficacious and helpful to meet those objectives. Assess how technology and other tools meet key criteria. This should be done before deployment when possible and consistent with public health demands, and on an ongoing basis. Questions should include: Can they be shown to be effective for their intended purposes? Can they be used without infringing on privacy? Can they be used without unfairly disadvantaging individuals or communities? Are there other alternatives that would help meet the objectives well without potentially negative consequences? Use of technologies and tools that are ineffective or raise privacy or other societal concerns should be discontinued promptly. Protect against bias and address inequities in technology access. In many cases, communities already disproportionately impacted by COVID-19 may lack access to technology, or not be fairly represented in data sets. Any use of digital tools must ensure that nobody is left behind. Set clear guidelines for how technology and other tools will be used. These should be aimed at ensuring that they will serve the public health objective while safeguarding privacy and other societal values. Public and private partners should be required to adhere to those guidelines, and the guidelines should be readily available to the public. Ensure that programs such as technology-assisted contact tracing are voluntary. Individual participation should be based on informed, affirmative consent, not coercion. Only collect individuals’ personal information needed for the public health objective. No other personal information should be collected in testing, contact tracing, and public information portals. Do not use or share individuals’ personal information for any other purposes. It is important to avoid “mission creep” and to prevent use for purposes unrelated to the pandemic such as for advertising, law enforcement, or for reputation management in non-public health settings. Secure individuals’ personal information from unauthorized access and use. Information collected from testing, contact tracing and information portals may be very revealing, even if it is not “health” information, and security breaches would severely damage public trust. Retain individuals’ personal information only for as long as it is needed. When it is no longer required for the public health objective, the information should be safely disposed of. Be transparent about data collection and use. Before their personal information is collected, individuals should be informed about what data is needed, the specific purposes for which the data will be used, and what rights they have over what’s been collected about them. Provide accountability. There must be systems in place to ensure that these principles are followed and to hold responsible parties accountable. In addition, individuals should have clear means to ask questions, make complaints, and seek recourse in connection with the handling of their personal information. The groups asked Vice President Pence for a meeting to discuss their concerns and suggested that the Coronavirus Task Force immediately create an interdisciplinary advisory committee comprised of experts from public health, data security, privacy, social science, and civil society to help develop effective standards. The Consumer Federation of America (link is external) is a nonprofit association of more than 250 consumer groups that was founded in 1968 to advance the consumer interest through research, advocacy, and education. The Center for Digital Democracy (CDD) is recognized as one of the leading NGOs organizations promoting privacy and consumer protection, fairness and data justice in the digital age. Since its founding in 2001 (and prior to that through its predecessor organization, the Center for Media Education), CDD has been at the forefront of research, public education, and advocacy.
  • Google’s (i.e., Alphabet, Inc.) proposed acquisition of Fitbit, a leading health wearable device company, is just one more piece illustrating how the company is actively engaged in shaping the future of public health. It has assembled a sweeping array of assets in the health field, positioning its advertising system to better take advantage of health information, and is playing a proactive role lobbying to promote significant public policy changes for medical data at the federal level that will have major implications (link is external)for Americans and their health.Google understands that there are tremendous revenues to be made gathering data—from patients, hospitals, medical professionals and consumers interested in “wellness”—through the various services that the company offers. It sees a lucrative future as a powerful presence in our health system able to bill Medicare and other government programs. In reviewing the proposed takeover, regulators should recognize that given today’s “connected” economy, and with Google’s capability and intention to generate monetizeable insights from individuals across product categories (health, shopping, financial services, etc.), the deal should not be examined solely within a narrow framework. While the acquisition directly bolsters Google’s growing clout in what is called the “connected-health” marketplace, the company understands that the move is also designed to maintain its dominance in search, video and other digital marketing applications. It’s also a deal that raises privacy concerns, questions about the future direction of the U.S. health system, and what kinds of safeguards—if any at all—will be in place to protect health consumers and patients. As health venture capital fund Rock Health explained in a recent report, “Google acquired Fitbit in a deal that gives the tech giant access to troves of personal health data and healthcare partnerships, in addition to health tracking software.” Fitbit reports that “28 million active users” worldwide use its wearable device products. For Google, Fitbit brings (link is external) a rich layer of personal data, expertise in fitness (link is external) tracking software, heart-rate sensors, as well as relationships with health-service and employee-benefit providers. Wearable devices can provide a stream (link is external)of ongoing data on our activities, physical condition, geolocation and more. In a presentation to investors made in 2018, Fitbit claimed to be the “number one health and fitness” app in the U.S. for both the Android and Apple app store, and considered itself the “number one “wearable brand globally,” available in 47,000 stores, and had “direct applications for health and wellness categories such as diabetes, heart health, and sleep apnea.” “Driving behavior change” is cited as one of the company’s fundamental capabilities, such as its “use of data…to provide insights and guidance.” Fitbit developed a “platform for innovative data collection” for clinical researchers, designed to help advance (link is external) “the use of wearable devices in research and clinical applications. Fitbit also has relationships with pharmacies, including those that serves people with “complex health conditions.” Fitbit has also “made a number of moves to expand its Health Services division,” such as its 2018 acquisition of Twine Health, a “chronic disease management platform.” In 2018, it also unveiled a “connected health platform that enables payers and health systems to deliver personalized coaching” to individuals. The company’s Fitbit Health Solutions division is working with more than 100 insurance companies in the U.S., and “both government sponsored and private plans” work with the company. Fitbit Premium was launched last year, which “mines consumer data to provide personalized health insights” for health care delivery. According to Business Insider Intelligence, “Fitbit plans to use the Premium service to get into the management of costly chronic conditions like diabetes, sleep apnea, and hypertension.” The company has dozens of leading “enterprises” and “Fortune 500” companies as customers. It also works with thousands of app developers and other third parties (think Google’s dominance in the app marketplace, such as its Play store). Fitbit has conducted research to understand “the relationship between activity and mood” of people, which offers an array of insights that has applications for health and numerous other “vertical” markets. Even prior to the formal takeover of Fitbit by Google, it had developed strong ties to the digital data marketing giant. It has been a Google Cloud client since 2018, using its machine learning prowess to insert Fitbit data into a person’s electronic health record (EHR). In 2018, Fitbit said that it was going to transfer its “data infrastructure” to the Google Cloud platform. It planned to “leverage Google’s healthcare API” to generate “more meaningful insights” on consumers, and “collaborate on the future of wearables.” Fitbit’s data might also assist Google in forging additional “ties with researchers who want to unlock the constant stream of data” its devices collect. When considering how regulators and others should view this—yet again—significant expansion by Google in the digital marketplace—the following issues must be addressed: Google Cloud and its use of artificial intelligence and machine learning in a new data pipeline for health services, including marketing Google’s Cloud service offers “solutions” (link is external) for the healthcare and life sciences industry, by helping to “personalize patient experiences,” “drive data interoperability,” and improve commercialization and operations”—including for “pharma insights and analytics.” Google Cloud (link is external) has developed a specific “API” (application programming interface) that enables health-related companies to process and analyze their data, by using machine learning technologies, for example. The Health Care Cloud API (link is external)also provides a range of other data functionalities (link is external) for clinical and other uses. Google is now working to help create a “new data infrastructure layer via 3 key efforts,” according to a recent report on the market. It is creating “new data pipes for health giants,” pushing the Google Cloud and building “Google’s own healthcare datasets for third parties.” (See, for example, “G Suite (link is external) for Healthcare Businesses” products as well as its “Apigee API Platform,” which works with the Cleveland Clinic, Walgreens, and others). Illustrating the direct connection between the Google Cloud and Google’s digital marketing apparatus is their case study (link is external) of the leading global ad conglomerate, WPP. “Our strong partnership with Google Cloud is key,” said WPP’s CEO, who explained that “their vast experience in advertising and marketing combined with their strength in analytics and AI helps us to deliver powerful and innovative solutions for our clients” (which include (link is external) “369 of the Fortune Global 500, all 30 of the Dow Jones 30 and 71 of the NASDAQ 100”). WPP links the insights and other resources it generates from the Google Cloud to Google’s “Marketing Platform” (link is external) so its clients can “deliver better experiences for their audiences across media and marketing.” Google has made a significant push (link is external) to incorporate the role that machine learning plays with marketing across product categories, including search and YouTube. It is using machine learning to “anticipate needs” of individuals to further its advertising (link is external) business. Fitbit will bring in a significant amount of additional data for Google to leverage in its Cloud services, which impact a number of consumer and commercial markets beyond (link is external) health care. The Fitbit deal also involves Google’s ambitions to become an important force providing healthcare providers access to patient, diagnostic and other information. Currently the market is dominated by others, but Google has plans for this market. For example, it has developed a “potential EHR tool that would empower doctors with the same kind of intuitive and snappy search functionality they've come to expect from Google.” According to Business Insider Intelligence, Google could bundle such applications along with Google Cloud and data analytics support that would help hospitals more easily navigate the move to data heavy (link is external), value-based care (VBC) reimbursement models (link is external).” Google Health already incorporates a wide range of health-related services and investments “Google is already a health company,” according (link is external) to Dr. David Feinberg, the company’s vice president at Google Health. Feinberg explains that they are making strides in organizing and making health data more useful thanks to work being done by Cloud (link is external) and AI (link is external) teams. And looking across the rest of Google’s portfolio of helpful products, we’re already addressing aspects of people’s health. Search helps people answer everyday health questions (link is external), Maps helps get people to the nearest hospital, and other tools and products are addressing issues tangential to health—for instance, literacy (link is external), safer driving (link is external), and air pollution (link is external)…. and in response, Google and Alphabet have invested in efforts that complement their strengths and put users, patients, and care providers first. Look no further than the promising AI research and mobile applications coming from Google and DeepMind Health (link is external), or Verily’s Project Baseline (link is external) that is pushing the boundaries of what we think we know about human health. Among Google Health’s initiatives are “studying the use of artificial intelligence to assist in diagnosing (link is external) cancer, predicting (link is external) patient outcomes, preventing (link is external) blindness…, exploring ways to improve patient care, including tools that are already being used by clinicians…, [and] partnering with doctors, nurses, and other healthcare professionals to help improve the care patients receive.” Through its AI work, Google is developing “deep learning” applications for electronic health records. Google Health is expanding its team, including specifically to take advantage of the wearables market (and has also hired a former FDA commissioner to “lead health strategy”). Google is the leading source of search information on health issues, and health-related ad applications are integrated into its core marketing apparatus A billion health-related questions are asked every day on Google’s search engine, some 70,000 every minute (“around 7 percent of Google’s daily searches”). “Dr. Google,” as the company has been called, is asked about conditions, medication, symptoms, insurance questions and more, say company leaders. Google’s ad teams in the U.S. promote how health marketers can effectively use its ad products, including YouTube, as well as understand how to take advantage of what Google has called “the path to purchase.” In a presentation on “The Role of Digital Marketing in the Healthcare Industry,” Google representatives reported that After conducting various studies and surveys, Google has concluded that consumers consult 12.4 resources prior to a hospital visit. When consumers are battling a specific disease or condition, they want to know everything about it: whether it is contagious, how it started, the side-effects, experiences of others who have had the same condition, etc. When doing this research, they will consult YouTube videos, read patient reviews of specific doctors, read blog articles on healthcare websites, read reviews, side-effects, and uses of particular medicines. They want to know everything! When consuming this information, they will choose the business that has established their online presence, has positive reviews, and provides a great customer experience, both online and offline. Among the data shared with marketers was information that “88% of patients use search to find a treatment center,” “60% of patients use a mobile device,” “60% of patients like to compare and validate information from doctors with their own online research,” “56% of patients search for health-related concerns on YouTube,” “5+ videos are watched when researching hospitals or treatment centers,” and that “2 billion health-related videos are on YouTube.” The “Internet is a Patient/Caregiver’s #1 confidant,” they noted. They also discussed how mobile technologies have triggered “non-linear paths to purchase,” and that mobile devices are “now the main device used for health searches.” “Search and video are vital to the patient journey,” and “healthcare videos represent one of the largest, fastest growing content segments on YouTube today.” Their presentation demonstrated how health marketers can take advantage of Google’s ability to know a person’s location, as well as how other information related to their behaviors and interests can help them “target the right users in the right context.” To understand the impact of all of Google’s marketing capabilities, one also should review the company’s restructured (and ever-evolving) “Marketing Platform.” Google’s Map Product will be able to leverage Fitbit data Google is using data related to health that are gathered by Google Maps, such as when we do searches for needed care services (think ERs, hospitals, pharmacies, etc.). “The most popular mapping app in the U.S…. presents a massive opportunity to connect its huge user base with healthcare services,” explain Business Insider Intelligence. Google has laid the groundwork with its project addressing the country’s opioid epidemic, linking “Google Maps users with recovery treatment centers,” as well as identifying where Naloxone (the reversal drug for opioid overdoes) is available. Last year, Google Maps launched a partnership with CVS “to help consumers more easily find places to drop off expired drugs.” Through its Waze subsidiary, which provides navigation information for drivers, Google sells ads to urgent care centers, which find new patients as a result of map-based, locally tailored advertisements. Google’s impact on the wearable marketplace, including health, wellness and other apps The acquisition of Fitbit will bolster Google’s position in the wearables market, as well as its direct and indirect role providing access to its own and third-party apps. Google Fit, which “enables Android users to pair health-tracking devices with their phone to monitor activity,” already has partnerships with a number of wearable device companies, such as Nike, Adidas and Noom. Business Intelligencer noted in January 2020 that Google Fit was “created to ensure Android devices have a platform to house user-generated health data (making it more competitive with Apple products). In 2019, Google acquired the smartwatch technology from Fossil. Fitbit will play a role in Google’s plans for its Fit service, such as providing additional data that can be accessed via third parties and made available to medical providers through patients’ electronic health records. The transaction, said one analyst, “is partly a data play,” and also one intended to keep customers from migrating from its Android platform to Apple’s. It is designed, they suggest, to ensure that Google can benefit from the sales of health-related services during the peak earning years of consumers. The Google Play app store offers access to an array of health and wellness apps that will be impacted by this deal. Antitrust authorities in the EU have already sanctioned Google for the way it has leveraged its Android platform for anti-competitive behavior. Google’s health related investments, including its use of artificial intelligence, and the role of Fitbit data Verily is “where Alphabet is doing the bulk of its healthcare work,” according to a recent report on the role AI plays in Google’s plans to “reinvent the $3 Trillion U.S. healthcare industry.” Verily is “focused on using data to improve healthcare via analytics tools, interventions, research” and other activities, partnering with “existing healthcare institutions to find areas to apply AI.” One of these projects is the “Study Watch, a wearable device that captures biometric data.” Verily has also made significant investments globally as it seeks to expand. DeepMind works on AI research, including how it is applicable to healthcare. Notably, DeepMind is working with the UK’s National Health Service. Another subsidiary, Calico, uses AI as part of its focus to address aging and age-related illnesses. Additionally, “GV” (Google Ventures) makes health-related investments. According to the CB Insights report, “Google’s strategy involves an end-to-end approach to healthcare, including: Data generation — This includes digitizing and ingesting data produced by wearables, imaging, and MRIs among other methods. This data stream is critical to AI-driven anomaly detection; Disease detection — Using AI to detect anomalies in a given dataset that might signal the presence of some disease; and Disease/lifestyle management — These tools help people who have been diagnosed with a disease or are at risk of developing one go about their day-to-day lives and/or make positive lifestyle modifications. Google has also acquired companies that directly further its health business capabilities, such as Apigee, Senosis Health and others. Google’s continuous quest to gather more health data, such as “Project Nightingale,” has already raised concerns. There are now also investigations of Google by the Department of Justice and State Attorney’s-General. The Department of Justice, which is currently reviewing the Google/Fitbit deal, should not approve it without first conducting a thorough review of the company’s health-related business operations, including the impact (including for privacy) that Fitbit data will have on the marketplace. This should be made a part of the current ongoing antitrust investigation into Google by both federal and state regulators. Congress should also call on the DoJ, as well as the FTC, to review this proposed acquisition in light of the changes that digital applications are bringing to health services in the U.S. This deal accompanies lobbying from Google and others that is poised to open the floodgates of health data that can be accessed by patients and an array of commercial and other entities. The Department of Health and Human Services has proposed a rule on data “interoperability” that, while ostensibly designed to help empower health services users to have access to their own data, is also a “Trojan Horse” designed to enable app developers and other commercial entities to harvest that data as an important new profit center. “The Trump Administration has made the unfettered sharing of health data a health IT priority,” explained one recent news report. Are regulators really ready to stop further digital consolidation? The diagnosis is still out! For a complete annotated version, please see attached pdf
  • Press Release

    Popular Dating, Health Apps Violate Privacy

    Leading Consumer and Privacy Groups Urge Congress, the FTC, State AGs in California, Texas, Oregon to Investigate

    Popular Dating, Health Apps Violate Privacy Leading Consumer and Privacy Groups Urge Congress, the FTC, State AGs in California, Texas, Oregon to Investigate For Immediate Release: Jan. 14, 2020 Contact: David Rosen, drosen@citizen.org (link is external), (202) 588-7742 Angela Bradbery, abradbery@citizen.org (link is external), (202) 588-7741 WASHINGTON, D.C. – Nine consumer groups today asked (link is external) the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), congressional lawmakers and the state attorneys general of California, Texas and Oregon to investigate several popular apps available in the Google Play Store. A report (link is external) released today by the Norwegian Consumer Council (NCC) alleges that the apps are systematically violating users’ privacy. The report found that 10 well-known apps – Grindr, Tinder, OkCupid, Happn, Clue, MyDays, Perfect365, Qibla Finder, My Talking Tom 2 and Wave Keyboard – are sharing information they collect on users with third-party advertisers without users’ knowledge or consent. The European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation forbids sharing information with third parties without users’ knowledge or consent. When it comes to drafting a new federal privacy law, American lawmakers cannot trust input from companies who do not respect user privacy, the groups maintain. Congress should use the findings of the report as a roadmap for a new law that ensures that such flagrant violations of privacy found in the EU are not acceptable in the U.S. The new report alleges that these apps (and likely a great many others) are allowing commercial third parties to collect, use and share sensitive consumer data in a way that is hidden from the user and involves parties that the consumer neither knows about nor would be familiar with. Although consumers can limit some tracking on desktop computers through browser settings and extensions, the same cannot be said for smartphones and tablets. As consumers use their smartphones throughout the day, the devices are recording information about sensitive topics such as our health, behavior, religion, interests and sexuality. “Consumers cannot avoid being tracked by these apps and their advertising partners because they are not provided with the necessary information to make informed choices when launching the apps for the first time. In addition, consumers are unable to make an informed choice because the extent of tracking, data sharing, and the overall complexity of the adtech ecosystem is hidden and incomprehensible to average consumers,” the letters sent to lawmakers and regulators warn. The nine groups are the American Civil Liberties Union of California, Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, the Center for Digital Democracy, Consumer Action, Consumer Federation of America, Consumer Reports, the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), Public Citizen and U.S. PIRG. In addition to calling for an investigation, the groups are calling for a strong federal digital privacy law that includes a new data protection agency, a private right of action and strong enforcement mechanisms. Below are quotes from groups that signed the letters: “Every day, millions of Americans share their most intimate personal details on these apps, upload personal photos, track their periods and reveal their sexual and religious identities. But these apps and online services spy on people, collect vast amounts of personal data and share it with third parties without people’s knowledge. Industry calls it adtech. We call it surveillance. We need to regulate it now, before it’s too late.” Burcu Kilic, digital rights program director, Public Citizen “The NCC’s report makes clear that any state or federal privacy law must provide sufficient resources for enforcement in order for the law to effectively protect consumers and their privacy. We applaud the NCC’s groundbreaking research on the adtech ecosystem underlying popular apps and urge lawmakers to prioritize enforcement in their privacy proposals.” Katie McInnis, policy counsel, Consumer Reports “U.S. PIRG is not surprised that U.S. firms are not complying with laws giving European consumers and citizens privacy rights. After all, the phalanx of industry lobbyists besieging Washington, D.C., has been very clear that its goal is simply to perpetuate a 24/7/365 surveillance capitalism business model, while denying states the right to protect their citizens better and denying consumers any real rights at all.” Ed Mierzwinski, senior director for consumer programs, U.S. PIRG “This report reveals how the failure of the U.S. to enact effective privacy safeguards has unleashed an out-of-control and unaccountable monster that swallows up personal information in the EU and elsewhere. The long unregulated business practices of digital media companies have shred the rights of people and communities to use the internet without fear of surveillance and manipulation. U.S. policymakers have been given a much-needed wake-up call by Norway that it’s overdue for the enactment of laws that bring meaningful change to the now lawless digital marketplace.” Jeff Chester, executive director, Center for Digital Democracy “For those of us in the U.S., this research by our colleagues at the Norwegian Consumer Council completely debunks the argument that we can protect consumers’ privacy in the 21st century with the old notice-and-opt-out approach, which some companies appear to be clinging to in violation of European law. Business practices have to change, and the first step to accomplish that is to enact strong privacy rights that government and individuals can enforce.” Susan Grant, director of consumer protection and privacy, Consumer Federation of America “The illuminating report by our EU ally the Norwegian Consumer Council highlights just how impossible it is for consumers to have any meaningful control over how apps and advertising technology players track and profile them. That’s why Consumer Action is pressing for comprehensive U.S. federal privacy legislation and subsequent strong enforcement efforts. Enough is enough already! Congress must protect us from ever-encroaching privacy intrusions.” Linda Sherry, director of national priorities, Consumer Action “For families who wonder what they’re trading off for the convenience of apps like these, this report makes the answer clear. These companies are exploiting us – surreptitiously collecting sensitive information and using it to target us with marketing. It’s urgent that Congress pass comprehensive legislation which puts the privacy interests of families ahead of the profits of businesses. Thanks to our friends at the Norwegian Consumer Council for this eye-opening research.” David Monahan, campaign manager, Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood “This report highlights the pervasiveness of corporate surveillance and the failures of the FTC notice-and-choice model for privacy protection. Congress should pass comprehensive data protection legislation and establish a U.S. Data Protection Agency to protect consumers from the privacy violations of the adtech industry.” Christine Bannan, consumer protection counsel, EPIC
  • In response to a call (link is external) for submissions by the UN Committee on the Right of the Child (link is external) on the topic of children’s rights in relation to the digital environment, CDD joins academics and advocates in submitting comments. The group calls on the Committee to recognize the far-reaching harms caused by digital marketing and the personal data extraction on which it is predicated. Many digital marketing practices infringe many rights enshrined in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (link is external). The Committee ought to recognize the need to protect children from these harms so children can fully enjoy the opportunities digital environments offer for their development and fulfilment of their rights.
  • Around the world citizens (link is external) and governments (link is external) are putting efforts toward limiting the marketing of unhealthy foods to children in order to address the growing obesity (link is external) epidemic worldwide. In the US, Congress and the Federal Trade Commission rely on weak self-regulatory industry standards, but under Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, the government of Canada wishes to see restrictions placed on the marketing of food and beverages to children. This was a goal written directly into the Health Minister's mandate letter (link is external) signed by Trudeau in October 2017. As a result, Health Canada, the department of the Canadian government with responsibility for national public health, is considering new regulations that would impose broader restrictions on food advertising that is targeted at those under 17. It could cover everything from TV, online and print advertising to product labelling, in-store displays and even end some sponsorships for sports teams. Health Canada's consultations (link is external) on how it should approach restricting advertising of "unhealthy food and beverages" to kids began in June of 2017 and concluded in early August last year. Although a few contributors opposed any attempt to restrict marketing to children, the summary report (link is external) states that "Overall, the proposed approach and supporting evidence for restricting marketing of unhealthy food and beverages to children were well received." The authors of the report point out that the "issue of age was not an area of inquiry," but most contributors supported the idea of including children between 13 and 17 years of age. Aiming to define "unhealthy foods," the consultation proposed to focus on restricting certain nutrients of concern (sodium, sugars, and saturated fats), and most commentators supported setting the stricter threshold option (of 5% ) for the proposed restrictions, which were based on a percentage of daily values (% DV). Commentators strongly preferred that option over the weaker proposal (15% DV). Using the percentage of daily values to define which foods are "healthy" or "unhealthy" relies on the already existing mandatory food labelling for most relevant foods. In addition to the proposal to restrict certain nutrients of concern, the proposed restrictions to the marketing of non-sugar sweeteners to children was also positively received. For the consultation, Health Canada looked at the Quebec ban (link is external) on advertising to children, which has been in place since 1980, and covers any advertising, not just food-related advertising. In that province, companies cannot market unhealthy food to children under 13 years old. Quebec has the lowest obesity rate (link is external) in Canada among children aged six to 11 and the highest rate of fruit and vegetable consumption. The Stop Marketing to Kids Coalition (link is external) (M2K Coalition), which includes the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada, the Childhood Obesity Foundation, the Canadian Cancer Society, Diabetes Canada, Dietitians of Canada, and the Quebec Coalition on Weight-Related Problems, supports the so-called Ottawa Principles (link is external). These evidence-based, expert-informed and collaboratively arrived principles call on governments to restrict the commercial marketing of all food and beverages to children and youth age 16 years and younger. Restrictions would include all forms of marketing with the exception of non-commercial marketing for public education. The M2K Coalition has taken this stance because of the complexities associated with defining healthy versus unhealthy food. The ad industry in Canada has some self-regulatory restrictions in place under the Canadian Children's Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative (link is external). That program, in which many major food companies are participants, sets out nutrition criteria for products that can be advertised in environments where kids under 12 make up 35 percent or more of the audience. The Association of Canadian Advertisers has criticized Health Canada's proposal as "significantly overbroad," calling it an "outright ban on most food and beverage marketing in Canada." The Canadian advertising initiative has tightened its criteria over time and is now monitoring online advertising more closely. 2016 was the first full year in which participating companies that advertise to kids had to ensure their products met new, tighter limits (link is external) on calories, sugar, sodium and saturated and trans fats. However, in 2017, a study (link is external) from the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada called into question how effective this effort has been. It looked at the most popular websites visited by children and teens, and found ads for products high in sugar, salt or fat. During the time that the Canadian government began to explore the right approach to restricting the marketing of unhealthy foods to children, Senator Nancy Greene-Raine introduced a private members bill in the Senate in the fall of 2016, seeking to amend the Food and Drugs Act to prohibit the marketing of unhealthy foods and beverages to children (Bill S-228). This would put the activities of Health Canada on a legal basis. The Senator amended the bill to reflect the federal government’s proposed approach on raising the age limit to age 16 and under and kept the focus on “unhealthy” food and beverages. Bill S-228, The Child Health Protection Act (link is external), unanimously passed the Senate in September 2017. Two amendments to the bill were introduced during the first hour of debate in the House of Commons in December 2017, which included a reduction in the age of protection to under 13 (from 17) years, and the introduction of a 5-year post-legislation review period. The rationale for the change in the age amendment was to make the bill more likely to withstand a court challenge, given that the Quebec legislation restricting marketing to children under 13 years withstood a legal challenge in the case of Irwin Toy v Quebec (1989). In this case, the Supreme Court of Canada allowed limits on commercial advertising to children under 13 as constitutionally valid. The Court confirmed that "...advertising directed at young children is per se manipulative." (link is external) And so, while the Court found that the restrictions violated the freedom of expression under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, a majority of the Court considered this violation to be a justifiable limitation necessary to protect children. For now, the bill is working its way through Parliament. Hopefully, the food industry will not further water down the requirements of the bill. If all goes well, our neighbor to the north will have a law in place by September 2018 that will advance public health and put children's health above the profits of the food industry. --- See attached infographic.
    Katharina Kopp