On Monday, October 7, 2019  PEP Director James Cooper spoke at a public workshop hosted by the Federal Trade Commission that discussed updating the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Rule. You can watch the full afternoon session here. Tune in at 3:30:00 to hear Director Cooper speak on Panel 4: “Uses and Misuses of Persistent Identifiers.” “I worry … Continue reading “PEP Director James Cooper Speaks at FTC Workshop – “The Future of the COPPA Rule””

The Program on Economics & Privacy (PEP) at George Mason University Antonin Scalia Law School invites applications for the 2019 – 2020 Privacy Fellowship. We seek authors to develop and present original work that focuses on the law and economics of issues surrounding the increasing regulatory scrutiny of online platforms. Issues of interest include, but … Continue reading “Call for Papers: 2019 – 2020 Privacy Fellowship”

PEP marked the end of the academic year with the seventh annual Public Policy Symposium on the Law & Economics of Privacy and Data Security. Speakers included:

Public demand for stronger privacy laws has reached a critical point, and congress is likely to pass sweeping, cross-technology and cross-industry privacy legislation for the first time in US history. This is an exciting juncture for information policy, but also a perilous one. Poorly constructed privacy laws can frustrate the interests of the people they … Continue reading “Durable Privacy Legislation: An Evidence-Based Privacy Law that Works for the People”

Registration is now open for PEP’s Seventh Annual Public Policy Symposium on the Law & Economics of Privacy and Data Security. The Symposium will be held Friday, May 10, 2019 in the Founders Hall Auditorium at GMU’s Scalia Law School. Click here for the Symposium agenda and to register.

On March 12, 2019, PEP Director Jane Bambauer testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on the likely impact of GDPR and the CCPA on innovation and consumer welfare. Following her testimony, Senator Lindsey Graham requested that Jane expand her testimony by answering a series of written questions. Jane provided her responses on April 3, 2019. … Continue reading “PEP Director Jane Bambauer Provides Further Testimony to Senate Judiciary Committee”

On Tuesday, March 12, 2019, PEP Director Jane Bambauer will give testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee on The Perils of Privacy as Property: The Likely Impact of GDPR and the CCPA on Innovation and Consumer Welfare. You can read Jane’s prepared testimony here.

This dispatch of the PEP report takes a fly-over view of the year that just came to a close. Here are a few of the most important developments in policy and research related to privacy, data security, and data stewardship. Story of the Year Cambridge Analytica News that Cambridge Analytica collected data on millions of … Continue reading “PEP 2018 Year in Review”

In 2014 and 2015, the research company Cambridge Analytica was able to amass a database of information on 87 million Facebook users, based on the survey results of just a few hundred thousand personality quiz participants. The company then used this data to try to get political consulting clients. In her new white paper, Program … Continue reading “Cambridge Analytica and the Meaning of Privacy Harm”

In his new white paper, Are Firms and Consumers Investing Enough in Data Security?, Program on Economics & Privacy affiliated scholar, Sasha Romanosky surveys the cybersecurity terrain and shows the gaps in the tool set used to assess cyber risks and resulting harms in order to answer the question of whether firms and consumers take … Continue reading “Are Firms and Consumers Investing Enough in Data Security?”