Google Wants Global Web Privacy Laws

With more and more people getting on the web each and every day, the concern on privacy on the internet is becoming more and more important.

Web 2.0 has turned the tables in allowing anyone to take part in online activities, whether that happens via blogging, keeping up with friends at MySpace, or uploading your latest video creation to YouTube for the world to see. With more of their personal information on the web, individual citizens around the world are now concerned with privacy policies just as much as businesses.

For these reasons and more, Google has now called for global privacy standards for the web, that are more in tune with the international nature of the internet. "Data may move across six or seven countries, even for very routine Internet transactions. It is not hard to see why privacy standards need to be harmonized and updated to reflect this reality," stated Peter Fleischer on Google's Public Policy blog.

To prove its point, Google provided three main factors that have contributed to our increased need for global privacy policy standards:

1. Globalization: With the global nature of the internet, all business today is potentially international business, and this scale calls for organizations and those within them to operate in multiple countries. As data crosses geographic boundaries, Google believes that the policies controlling should remain constant.
2. Growing Knowledge of Privacy Rights: Google has realized that experts are no longer the only ones discussing privacy anymore, as ordinary citizens enter into the debate. Increased attention to privacy among the general public has resulted in more national and local privacy laws which, in turn, have increased the fragmentation of global privacy policy.
3. Technological Development: As technology is enhanced, more and more information travels around the world faster and faster each day. Although such developments increase the productivity of business and consumer transactions, Google warns that it can potentially endanger privacy protections.

I could not agree more with what Google has discovered, and although the process is sure to be complicated and time-consuming, Google is probably the best company to propose such a call for action, considering their status on the internet.

"Countries cannot and will not be able to write effective privacy legislation without global cooperation. And as long as there are no global standards for privacy protection, individuals and businesses will remain at risk as they operate online," stated Google.

To work towards a solution, Google is calling for a discussion about international privacy standards to protect everyone's privacy on the Internet. "These standards must be clear and strong, mindful of commercial realities, and in line with oftentimes divergent political needs. Moreover, global privacy standards need to reflect technological realities, taking into account how quickly these realities can change."

With individual governments having final say over the laws of their land, I am not quite sure the task would be as simple as Google seems to have made it sound. According to Google, their best bet is to build on the APEC Framework, which was developed in the internet age and already carefully balances information privacy with business needs and commercial interests.

All I can say is "Good Luck" and may the force be with Google.