From what I can tell the situation seems to be that some member states are playing ball and have enforced the Cookie Directive (2009/136/EC) and others, such as the UK, have been dragging their heels. This involvesapplications of the Directives where consent does not need to be obtained upfront. Hmm!
I have not read the NY Times article, but it is not all cookie-use that is affected and it is possibly here where the confusion lay. Instead whereas in the past website owners/managers had to tell users how they used cookies, and how users might opt-out if they objected, they now have to gain consent from users if they are to place cookies on a user’s machine. Exceptions to this rule are restricted to situations where the placement of cookies relates to a service explicitly requested by the user, as with the case of automatic form-filling for example. Third-party cookies, the type employed by behavioral advertising firms, are given special attention by the legislation. I wrote a paper published with NMS on this here: http://nms.sagepub.com/content/early/2012/09/24/1461444812458434.full Cheers, Andy
---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Charles Ess <charles.ess@gmail.com> To: Air list <air-l@listserv.aoir.org> Cc: Date: Sat, 26 Jan 2013 10:23:18 +0100 Subject: [Air-L] NY Times story on privacy legislation Dear privacy wonks,
I've just read a NY Times story reporting on U.S. business and governmental lobbying of the European Parliament to weaken what are characterized as current European proposals, including: "Web businesses would be unable to perform basic collecting and profiling of individual computer users unless they gave their explicit consent as part of policies that allow them to specify what kinds of information could be collected and for what purpose." As I understand it, however, the requirement for such consent is already law under the recently amended EU ePrivacy Directive. While not all websites respond this way (yet - but the law, as I understand it, allows some time for implementation), many in my experience on this side of the pond are already compliant, i.e., at first visit there is a request for consent to accept the use of cookies (e.g., most recently, at <http://ccc.ku.dk/calendar/2013/methodologies_of_mobile/>).
Of course, as a philosopher, my relationship with reality, much less the U.S. and European legal systems, is a strained and tortured one, so I'm more than willing to accept that I'm wrong on one or more counts here. So help, please.
Did the Times get this bit wrong? (and, gasp!) And/or - what else am I missing?
Many thanks in advance, - charles ess
Associate Professor in Media Studies Department of Media and Communication
Director, Centre for Research on Media Innovations <http://www.hf.uio.no/imk/english/research/center/media-innovations/>
University of Oslo P.O. Box 1093 Blindern NO-0317 Oslo Norway email: charles.ess@media.uio.no