Issue 5: The FTC’s had a week

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This week, the newsletter could honestly just be called "FTC stuff." Things are HAPPENING. First of all, Commissioner Noah Phillips said he's stepping down. He's got three years left of his seven-year term, but he's jumping ship to spend more time with his fam. You know, get home for dinner more. But he did take a subtle dig at his fellow commissioners in his memo on bailing, saying "other commissioners weren’t open to discussion and compromise," according to Politico.

It might sound a little crazy, but, that's not the biggest news coming from the FTC this week. Privacy Twitter lost its collective mind, once again, when the FTC announced it's aiming to create broad rules on privacy in the U.S.

THAT'S NOT EVEN THE END OF THE FTC NEWS: It's threatening to sue an ad tech company for selling pregnant women's sensitive data, plus, Commissioner Phillips is stepping down.

FTC to regulate "commercial surveillance" cuz Congress can't pass a privacy law

If you didn't see the news last week, you must have been on an island. If so, huge congrats on that. But here's what happened. The FTC decided it's not going to sit around waiting for Congress to address privacy. It's started a rule-making process on "commercial surveillance," which some say is some virtue signaling in itself. It's asked the public for feedback on no less than 95 questions ranging from children's privacy rules, to algorithmic discrimination, to sensitive data. The process itself will take years to complete, and it's possible that if the American Data Privacy and Protection Act passes, the agency will back down completely. Commissioner Alvaro Bedoya has said as much. A Sept. 8 public forum aims to let the public weigh in, and it should be rather spicy if reactions to the announcement itself are any indication. For an in-depth look at this news and what it means, check out this webinar with Wilson Sonsini's Maneesha Mithal and Goodwin Procter's Gabe Maldoff, as well as TerraTrue's own Jason Gerson and myself.

Post-Dobbs reality already setting in

We all knew it wouldn't be long before the Dobbs decision started messing up lives in real ways. You may have seen some of the hot takes immediately following the decision: "Delete your period apps, turn off anything that tracks you." While some dismissed those calls as alarmist, it didn't take long to see the real world implications.

As The Washington Post reports here, the Federal Trade Commission is threatening to sue an ad tech company it alleges reveals people's visits to sensitive locations, including women's reproductive health clinics."

You may recall that after the Dobbs decision came down, President Joe Biden asked the FTC to protect women and birthing parents' rights.

You might be thinking: If the U.S. had a federal privacy law, would this be an issue? And you wouldn't be wrong to think that way. But, you know, Congress.

As Vox reported in June, Biden wrote to the agency telling it that it "should not tolerate unfair or deceptive practices related to reporting, surveillance, sharing or sale of personal information — including sensitive health-related information — in any state.”

The FTC says Kochava is violating laws on unfair and deceptive practices by allowing customers "to license data collected from mobile devices that can identify people and track their visits to health-care providers." And not only health care providers, but also addiction save-havens and therapists' offices -- right down to a timestamp.

The lawsuit isn't going to sit well with conservative judges on the extreme right, who tend to think that agencies run by boards of commissioner (the FTC) are inherently unconstitutional, so there's a chance this suit fuels some fire.

GOP wants a Khan-like commissioner, but a Republican

It's hard to tell where this one's going to go. The GOP typically takes a "get your government out of my affairs" approach to things, but conservative advocacy groups want Phillips' position replaced with someone who's going to be hard on Big Tech? That seems a strange hybrid.

THAT meme goin' around: Privacy edition

I don't really have anything smart to say about this. I just thought these privacy takes on that meme that's been going around and around were chuckle-worthy. And it's Friday, so.

Thanks for reading, and we'll see you next week!