Charter to Hill: Opt For Opt-In For All

Charter is ramping up its call for online privacy legislation that applies opt-in requirements on the sharing of personal info, no matter who is doing the sharing.

That came in a letter to the Hill from Charter EVP Catherine Bohigian, which followed Charter CEO Tom Rutledge's blog two weeks ago calling for an opt-in regime for all.

It also follows Hill hearings with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg three weeks ago and a concomitant boost in Hill sentiment for regulating edge players whose power has grown from "garage" to gargantuan.

Related: Dems Have Hundreds More Questions for Zuckerberg

"Following Congressional hearings earlier this month, a new study was fielded by research firm HarrisX that found that 83 percent of respondents think we need tougher regulations and penalties for breaches of data privacy," Bohigian wrote to members of Congress. "In an ever-expanding digital world, an American public who is increasingly skeptical about engaging online is not only bad business for all of us in the Internet ecosystem, it is a threat to our nation’s future economic growth."

"Holding different Internet entities to different standards results in greater confusion, increased consumer concern and an overall lack of confidence in online economic transactions and social media interactions," she said

John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.