The Feds Are Prepping Strict Rules to Protect Your Online Privacy

Tom Wheeler, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, has proposed what could become the largest and most stringent set of privacy regulations on the US technology industry to date.

The rules, if passed, will prohibit Internet service providers from selling customer data without consumers’ prior consent and limit the kinds of products Internet providers can market to customers based their online activity. Wheeler’s announcement comes even as consumer privacy dominates the news with a courtroom battle over whether the government can compel Apple to help crack the encryption on a customer’s phone to advance a terrorism investigation.

Wheeler appears to think the government has a role to play in protecting user privacy, stating in a blogpost on Thursday that FCC regulations “limit your phone company’s ability to repurpose and resell what it learns about your phone activity. The same should be true for information collected by your ISP.”