The Death of the Privacy Policy?: Effective Privacy Disclosures After In re Sears

摘要

Although privacy lawyers were surprised by the FTC's complaint and Sears's settlement, this Note has argued that the Commission properly analyzed Sears's conduct as a deceptive practice under Section 5 of the FTCA. Sears failed to disclose the scope of personal information that the My SHC Community tracking application would monitor, and this failure was a material omission likely to create a misleading impression in reasonable consumers. Although Sears did ultimately describe the scope of its tracking in the PSULA, that disclosure was inadequate, particularly given Sears's emphasis on user choice and control in its initial contacts with consumers.