Consumer Reports writes in support of SB 6. Though the collection and monetization of Connecticut consumers’ personal data has dramatically expanded over the last thirty years, consumers have almost no say over whether their information will be shared by a company with countless others. This important proposal will help protect Connecticut consumers’ privacy online by extending the right to know the information companies have collected about them, the right to delete that information, and the right to stop the disclosure of certain information to third parties, with additional rights for sensitive data.
New protections are long overdue: consumers are constantly tracked, and information about their online and offline activities are combined to provide detailed insights into a consumers’ most personal characteristics, including health conditions, political affiliations, and sexual preferences. This information is sold as a matter of course, is used to deliver targeted advertising, facilitates differential pricing, and enables opaque algorithmic scoring—all of which can lead to disparate outcomes along racial and ethnic lines.
For the full letter, please see the attached PDF.