Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Consumer Protection Director Jessica Rich expressed strong words to ad companies at an industry event on Thursday, MediaPost reports. She said the industry should not “play games about what ‘sensitive data’ means, such as defining medical data to mean only official medical records.” Rich also discussed the self-regulatory codes of the Network Advertising Initiative (NAI) and the Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA), noting that both define “sensitive” data differently. “The NAI code is stronger than DAA’s in this regard,” she noted. Recognizing that behavioral ads do have some benefits, Rich also discussed enhanced forms of online tracking and that consumers “who know about tracking and want to avoid it can’t do so effectively.” Editor’s Note: Jessica Rich will speak about privacy enforcement at the IAPP Global Privacy Summit in Washington, DC, this March.
Full Story