Clinton Proposes New Privacy Protections

President Clinton over the weekend proposed new privacy legislation allowing consumers to stop financial companies from sharing information about them.

Clinton made the comments during a commencement address at Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti, saying that privacy protections were needed because technological advances have made it easier to collect and disseminate consumer information.

“In this information age we can’t let new opportunities erode old fundamental rights,” Clinton said. “We can’t let breakthroughs in technology break down laws of privacy.”

Current laws are not enough to protect consumers, Clinton said, because they do not stop subsidiaries of the same company from sharing information with each other.

Though proposed legislation exists in both the House and Senate, Congress is not likely to act on consumer privacy protections this year due to the all-important November elections. But with growing public support of the issue, new legislation could be reviewed sometime next year.