By Lou Mastria
Big Idea: As we watch democracy do its work, industry leaders review the proposed American Privacy Rights Act (APRA) and its potential impact on interest-based advertising.
Policy watchers from the digital advertising community discuss the prospects of a federal privacy bill moving through Congress in 2024.
One of the benefits of getting together at each year’s Digital Advertising Alliance Summit is the opportunity to discuss public policy – federal, state, even international – and how privacy, security and data protection law can impact responsible data flows, either to facilitate – or potentially restrict – a more relevant advertising experience for consumers.
This year’s 2024 Summit – New ADitude – had a heightened level of focus on Capitol Hill, as a potential Congressional committee markup of the American Privacy Rights Act (APRA) was pending. We had the opportunity to listen in as leading policy advocates and watchers weighed in on the lawmaking process this year.
At this year’s Summit, the “federal” law panel included Laquan Austion, vice president, public policy - government relations, Association of National Advertisers; Lewis Borg, data privacy officer – US, Unilever; and Michael Signorelli, partner, Venable LLP, and counsel to DAA. The three weighed in on the calculus of various drafts of the proposed APRA legislation.
A Moving Target of Drafts
Venable’s Michael Signorelli provided DAA Summit 24 attendees with a summary of potential federal privacy legislation during the current Congress.
As the Summit session opened, Signorelli recounted a journey through some of the key components of the proposed bill – as the draft stood on June 12. (As of the publishing of this blog post, there have been additional updates since.) He reiterated that the business community would welcome a national, preemptive data privacy law that created reasonable data standards. According to Signorelli, the bill would have established a “construct” where covered data may be used only for enumerated purposes, some of them marketing related yet limited in scope.
Since there is still no full committee mark-up scheduled for this bill, as of July, we will withhold a discussion of what these business purposes may be, and what may be restricted. Suffice to say, targeted advertising – as we know it today in programmatic digital display – is one of the discussion points in the various drafts floated. The advertising community, and wider business community, is vociferously advocating for the protection of this vital method of commercial speech and competition.
The outcome of such advocacy remains uncertain. The House Committee on Energy and Commerce did not consider the bill in a markup at its scheduled June 27 meeting. In fact, the meeting was cancelled.
Data Minimization as Policy
On other areas covered by the proposed legislation, Borg spotlighted how data minimization is an important motivator for marketing organizations to consider -- as the provisions in the draft bill go beyond existing U.S. state privacy law requirements or other global privacy laws, such as the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).
Adhering to the concept of data minimization – using available data for limited purposes – can provide certain benefits, but also can have unintended consequences, for example on future product development. It is important to “think through” transparency at the point of collection.
Unilever’s Lewis Borg notes experiences as a privacy policy watcher on both sides of the Atlantic.
Borg stated, further, that although GDPR is already in place, the pace of change in privacy law in the United States – state and federal -- is quicker and more dramatic.
The panel also discussed other considerations for U.S. federal policy – among them potential changes to the existing Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, as well as restrictions on transacting data with foreign adversaries – two areas where there is broad industry agreement, at least in principle.
DAA thanks our legal associate Briana Humphrey for her research and editorial support with this post.
