28 Mar 2017 6:33 pm
Letting Internet providers collect and sell their customers' Web browsing history, location information, health data and other personal details.The House just voted to wipe out the FCC’s landmark Internet privacy protections.
House Republicans voted overwhelmingly Tuesday, by a margin of 215-205, to repeal a set of landmark privacy protections for Web users, issuing a sweeping rebuke of Internet policies enacted under the Obama administration.
It also marks a sharp, partisan pivot toward letting Internet providers collect and sell their customers' Web browsing history, location information, health data and other personal details.
The measure, which was approved by a 50-48 margin in the Senate last week, now heads to the White House, where President Trump is expected to sign it.
Congress's joint resolution empowers Internet providers to enter the $83 billion market for online advertising now dominated by Google and Facebook.
It is likely to lend momentum to a broader GOP rollback of Obama-era technology policies, and calls into question the fate of other tech regulations such as net neutrality, which was approved in 2015 over strident Republican objections and bans Internet providers from discriminating against websites.
And it is a sign that companies such as AT&T, Comcast and Verizon will be treated more permissively at a time when conservatives control both the executive and legislative branches.
Great.