Promises to Keep
Ten months ago, privacy advocate Evan Hendricks predicted that consumer outrage over the privacy issue would approach the fervor of the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s.
We haven’t yet seen any privacy lobbyists sitting in at lunch counters, but Evan is right in hinting that DMers are in for trouble. For example, Al Gore (only 12 shaky Senate votes away from being president, according to some counts) has called for an Electronic Bill of Rights and given other indications that he will be an activist.
At the same time, the European Union has adopted measures that would never work in the United States, but which could well find their way here.
In a splendid presentation at the National Center for Database Marketing Conference in Orlando, FL last month, Experian’s Marty Abrams pointed out that the Europeans operate on a different model. In the United States, the issue is how you use data; in Europe, it’s whether you even have it.
Which system is better? It’s no contest, Marty says: The United States relies on the free flow of information to maintain its position as the world’s only true service economy.
Of course, our information business must look like the Wild West to some in the EU: You can use data for marketing purposes without notifying consumers of the slightest variation from original intent.
And yet, in the safe harbor negotiations going on as we write this, the Clinton administration has the delicate task of convincing Europeans that we offer adequate protections, and that our self-regulatory system works.
Its trump card? The Direct Marketing Association’s Privacy Promise program. The DMA, as you probably have heard, is setting itself up as a quasi-official enforcement agency. Starting next July, it will throw you out-publicly-if you don’t do the following:
* Subscribe to MPS and TPS, and adhere to DMA ethical guidelines.
* Honor direct requests to remove names from lists.
* Publish an opt-out message in your catalogs and other materials.
Is this too much to ask? You’d better hope that Uncle Sam doesn’t think it’s too little.
Either way, it may be too late. In December the White House asked the DMA to demonstrate now that the industry can regulate itself. So the DMA is asking members to speed up compliance. As Marty Abrams said, 95% adherence by national mailers would be great, 85% would be good and 65% not so good.
We’re not there yet. During the NCDM session, a poll of the audience showed that while most belonged to the DMA, maybe only half had signed up for Privacy Promise.
But that’s not bad, considering that July is still the official deadline.
Want to keep making the big green in our free market? Sign up for Privacy Promise now.
