Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Privacy topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
FTC Commissioner warns of ‘mutually reinforcing’ privacy crisis and urges state action
Summary
Federal Trade Commissioner Rebecca Kelly Slaughter told the California Privacy Protection Agency that concentrated commercial surveillance plus ‘unbalanced executive power’ pose a systemic threat to privacy and democratic norms, and she urged state-level data-minimization, vigorous enforcement and coordination across states.
Rebecca Kelly Slaughter, a commissioner at the Federal Trade Commission, told the California Privacy Protection Agency on April 30 that the United States faces a “mutually reinforcing crisis” when commercial surveillance and concentrated executive power converge.
Slaughter told the board she has seen this dynamic from her vantage at the FTC and in pending litigation, and warned that platforms and data brokers now hold comprehensive profiles of large swaths of the population. "When unchecked commercial surveillance is combined with unbalanced executive power, we have not just two separate problems, but a mutually reinforcing crisis," she said.
Why it matters: Slaughter argued that concentrated data markets make avoidance and meaningful consent essentially impossible, and that political control over enforcement agencies weakens legal backstops. She cited FTC enforcement tools — the FTC Act and COPPA among them — and urged the agency and state actors to consider data-minimization rules that limit what companies may collect, how they use it and how long they retain it.
Slaughter detailed recent FTC actions and litigation against large companies and data brokers. She described cases in which firms amassed vast location and behavioral profiles and sold them — sometimes to federal agencies — and said those practices can circumvent warrant requirements by providing government actors with behavioral dossiers without judicial oversight. "There are instances in which these laws are being ignored and information is being shared among agencies and outside entities in ways that appear to violate these legal protections," she said.
On enforcement and independence, Slaughter criticized recent removals or attempted removals of agency commissioners, saying they create a ‘‘chilling effect’’ that undermines enforcement. "The four-cause removal protections ensure that decisions are made on the merits," she said, adding that attacks on independence can make buying commercial surveillance data easier for government actors.
Board response and next steps: Board members pressed Slaughter on priorities and whether states can meaningfully act. She declined to rank risks but recommended both state-level data-minimization—limiting collection and retention at the outset—and vigorous state enforcement of commercial actors, including pursuing data brokers. Slaughter also urged multi-state coordination and said private rights of action provide an essential backstop when federal enforcement is politically constrained.
What’s next: Slaughter urged the California board to study data-minimization models and administrative rules and to coordinate with other states. Her talk provided the board with a federal-enforcement perspective the agency’s members said they would weigh as they consider regulatory or enforcement responses under California law.
