The House of Representatives approved legislation on Tuesday, March 28, 2017, that will repeal FCC guidelines created late last year to protect user data.
In December, the FCC passed a rule titled “Protecting the Privacy of Customers of Broadband and Other Telecommunication Services.” The rule, which was approved in a 3-2 vote, would protect internet users from having their personal information taken by their ISPs (Internet Service Providers) and then sold to companies who could use the information for marketing, according to The Washington Post. The rule was scheduled to go into effect later this year.
On Tuesday, members of the U.S. House of Representatives voted to approve Senate Joint Resolution 34, which calls for the repeal of this rule. S.J. Res. 34 now goes to President Trump for his signature and, according to whitehouse.gov, Trump’s advisers would recommend he sign the bill into law.
If passed, the repeal of the FCC rule would not only allow ISPs to track user history, but they could take that browsing data, as well as app usage and location information, to sell to companies. Corporations could then use that information to produce specific advertisements to be projected to that user or in other ways depending on the individual user.
No information has been released about when President Trump will sign the bill or when the bill would take effect.
