The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has announced that
Amazon.com and Alexa Internet, an Amazon.com search engine
subsidiary, probably made deceptive statements in their privacy
practices. It is the second Amazon.com decision by the FTC within
one week. However, the FTC has decided not to act because the
particular service that caused most concern has been shut down and
Alexa has changed its privacy policy to more accurately reflect its
practices.
Alexa and Amazon.com claimed in their original privacy policies
that they did not keep personally identifiable information about
customers in Alexa’s web-usage patterns database. In fact, there
was such information in the database. The FTC said both Alexa and
Amazon.com probably deceived their customers when making the
original privacy policy statement.
The FTC decision does not rule out the possibility of taking
further action against Amazon.com and Alexa. However, Jason Catlett
of privacy watchdog Junkbusters says that the FTC’s failure to act
could set a dangerous precedent for engaging in deceptive practices
that could ultimately harm on-line retail.
Junkbusters has responded to the FTC decision by sending a
letter requesting that the FTC orders Amazon.com to submit a full
privacy audit. Last week, the FTC rejected a petition from
Junkbusters and the Electronic Privacy Information Centre (EPIC)
requesting that it investigate alleged deception in Amazon.com’s
update of its privacy policy last year.
Catlett claims that by not punishing Amazon and Alexa for either
transgression, the FTC could harm consumer confidence in
e-commerce. He is quoted by Techweb.com as saying,“it sends a
terrible message to companies that they can lie about their
information practices, and that if they are caught, they can change
their practices”.
