09-02-2000

TECHNOLOGY: Polls Show We're in the Mood for Privacy

Priority for Congress: In a January 25 poll by NBC News and The Wall
Street Journal, 16 percent of the 1,010 respondents said Congress's
highest priority this year should be ensuring the privacy of financial and
medical data. Only the adding of a prescription drug benefit to Medicare
got a higher rating, 23 percent.


The parties and privacy: In a June 26 Fox News-Opinion Dynamics poll of
900 registered voters, 29 percent said the Republicans "would do a
better job of protecting the privacy of your personal records and
information." Twenty-two percent thought the Democrats would do
better, 29 percent thought both or neither, and 21 percent were not
sure.


Presidential candidates: In a late-July ABC News/Washington Post poll of
1,228 adults, presidential candidates Al Gore and George W. Bush scored
equally well on the question "Which ... do you trust to do a better
job" on protecting people's privacy on the Internet? Gore scored 39
percent and Bush scored 40 percent, with the remainder split between
both-neither or don't know.


Control over data: In an October 1999 poll by Forrester Research, 90
percent of the respondents said people should have the right to control
the use of data about a business transaction, and 80 percent favor laws
banning the resale of data by the seller.


Also, in a poll released in early March by Penn, Schoen, and Berland
Associates, 29 percent of 1,000 voters said strong regulations are the
best way to protect medical and financial records, while 4 percent said
such regulations would hurt the Internet's growth. But 65 percent of
Democrats and 61 percent of Republicans agreed with the statement that
"the best way to protect the privacy of personal records is to give
individuals more personal control over who sees those records, rather than
passing strong federal restrictions."


The "opt-in" option: In a poll of 2,117 Americans, including
1,017 Internet users, conducted by the Pew Internet and American Life
Project during May and June, 86 percent of the respondents said they want
rules requiring companies to get customers' opt-ins before using their
personal data. But only 24 percent said the federal government was best
suited to draft these privacy regulations, with 50 percent saying Internet
users are best able to write the rules.




National Journal