FTC Chairwoman Expresses Concern Over Data Collection In Consumer Electronics

Your health tracker, your connected home devices, and even your cars with their smart infotainment systems all collect information on you, but we guess you already knew that and to a certain extent in the case of health trackers, you might even welcome it. However while you might be more than happy to let these devices track you, the FTC is a little skeptical.

Speaking at CES 2015, FTC Chairwoman Edith Ramirez expressed her concern that the potential for abuse of the private user information collected by these devices. Ramirez also stated that these companies should work towards developing products that will do more to protect consumer privacy and data.

Ramirez was quoted as saying that these devices are “collecting, transmitting, storing and often sharing vast amounts of consumer data, some of it highly personal, and thereby creating significant privacy risks.” This isn’t the first time that Ramirez has tried to raise awareness on the issue as she and other FTC officials have been trying to do that for the past few years.

She called for tech and consumer electronic companies to integrate security protection into future gadgets, to collect as little data as possible on their customers, and to give customers more choice as to what these companies can do with their data. Will these companies actually listen? We guess we’ll just have to wait and see, but in the meantime do you agree with Ramirez’s stance?

Tyler Lee
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Tags: ftc, Security