NTIA within the Department of Commerce will hold a meeting to discuss how to deal with transparency when companies provide applications and interactive services for mobile devices that handle personal data. NTIA will conduct the meeting for multi-stakeholders on July 12, 2012 in the Washington D.C metro area with the venue to be announced no later than 15 days before the meeting and sooner if possible.
In March, NTIA requested comments concerning privacy issues with many stakeholders identifying transparency issues associated with mobile apps as a major topic of concern. Mobile apps are socially and economically important, but mobile devices pose distinct consumer privacy challenges, such as disclosing relevant information on a small display. In addition, practices surrounding the disclosure of consumer data privacy practices do not appear to have kept pace with rapid developments in technology and business models.
The issue of mobile app transparency potentially impacts a range of industry participants that includes not only developers of mobile apps but also providers of sophisticated interactive services for mobile devices and mobile app platforms plus others.
The July 12th meeting will be the first in a series of NTIA multi-stakeholder discussions on the topic. The objectives of the meeting will be to work with stakeholders on the format of future meetings.
For more information, email John Verdi at jverdi@ntia.doc.gov or call 202-482-7002.
