14 DAY TRIAL // The controversial bill that will allow ISPs to sell off customers' data has received the vote of approval in the House of Representatives too, following last week's vote in the Senate.
The bill passed by 232 votes to 184, which was to be expected given the number of Republicans in the Congress. President Trump also supports the bill, as was stated by the White House spokesman, which means it will soon become law that Internet Service Providers can sell off your data without getting your approval.
Be it Comcast, AT&T, Verizon, Time Warner Cable or any other smaller ISP, they will all be lawfully allowed to sell everything they know about you and the way you use the Internet to third parties. This is done without getting your approval or even informing you.
What kind of information could they possibly have on you? Well, everything. Your name and address, and maybe even your age and your social security number, are on the contract. Then, ISPs know everything you do on the Internet - what websites you visit and how often, which is precious information for advertisers.
All this data paints a very clear picture about who you are - what your political affiliations are, what your sexual orientation is, whether you have kids, when you're at home, if you suffer any type of sickness, and so on.
The Register did a little math to put a price tag on this bill. It seems that all this information is worth $30 per household per month. The price jumps to $60 if you get Internet access through your cable providers, which is something most people do, because it enables those companies to correlate the TV usage to Internet usage. With some 100 million households online in the United States, Big Cable got an annual payday between $35 billion and $70 billion.
How to wipe all privacy rules in two months
It wasn't long ago that the situation was completely different, with ISPs complaining that they were getting too much regulation and not enough room to do business. Well, by nixing this FCC regulation before it even went into effect, the US lawmakers did just that - gave them enough room to bathe in cash.
A few years back, when the FCC had another director, the watchdog declared broadband providers to be "common carriers," effectively gaining control over legislation that affects them. Immediately, they set down new privacy rules, including the fact that ISP required customers to explicitly give them their consent to sell their most sensitive information.
Now, customers will have to do the exact opposite - go to the trouble of telling companies they do not want their data to be shared with marketers. This is an annoyance that many customers will likely not bother with, without even realizing just how much those companies know about them.
The situation is likely only going to worsen for Internet users as the new head of the FCC, Ajit Pai, expressed his opposition to strict privacy rules since before he occupied this top position.