Security, Regulatory & Legislative Issues
The Spyware Control and Privacy Protection Act of 2001 pertains to issues of disclosure and privacy. The Act places restrictions on the ability of businesses to include in their distributed applications the capability of gathering user information and disseminating this information to the software company or some other third party. The legislation includes the demand that any business that uses information-gathering must make it clearly visible to consumers that such information is being collected. The legislation also mandates that consumers must be able to view a summary of all information collected that pertains to them. One of the most important features of the legislation is that it mandates that no company is able to collect personal information for such purposes without first gaining the consent of consumers. Section 2, C(2) of the legislation pertains to Enablement of Capability, “A capability of computer software described in paragraph (1) may not be enabled unless the user of such computer software provides affirmative consent, in advance, to the enablement of the capability” (Spyware 2001, 2).
The legislation also provides exempted categories that are not protected by the Spyware Act that enable companies to collect information that is “reasonably needed” to:
A) upon request of the user, provide reasonable access by user to information so collected;
B) provide a reasonable opportunity for the user to correct, delete, or supplement such information; and
C) make the correction or supplementary information a part of the information about the user for purposes of any future use of such information under this subsection.
The legislation provides for private right of action and recovery of monetary loss in an amount equal to the greater of the actual monetary loss or $2,500 for each violation not to exceed a total of $500,000. Litigation costs and attorney...