WASHINGTON – U.S. Senators Chris Coons (D-Del.) and Al Franken (D-Minn.) today announced that, at their urging, OnStar has decided to reverse its earlier decision to track the locations of its customers and potentially sell that information to third parties even after those customers have terminated their service plans with the company.
“As location-based mobile technology becomes a larger part of consumers' lives, it's important that we're vigilant about balancing convenience with privacy,” Senator Coons said. “I'm glad that OnStar heard our concerns and has decided to reverse course. OnStar's announcement today is an important step toward restoring the trust consumers had placed in it, and I hope that other companies learn from this experience. Systems that automatically track users' locations should, by default, protect their users' privacy. Sensitive personal information should not be for sale without users' explicit consent.”
“OnStar did the right thing today, and I’m glad that so many consumers now won’t have to worry about their location information being shared without their consent,” Senator Franken said. “While I'm pleased that OnStar reversed its policy, I still have questions about how that company and others are treating consumers’ location information. I also hope this spurs Congress to pass my location privacy bill to prevent situations like this in the future. Consumers have a right to know what data is being collected about them and have a right to decide whether they want to share that information and when.”
Earlier this year, Senator Coons cosponsored the Location Privacy Protection Act — introduced by Senator Franken — which would require companies like OnStar to obtain their customers’ explicit permission before tracking their location information or sharing that information with third parties. In addition to Senator Coons, the Location Privacy Protection Act currently has four other co-sponsors, including: Senators Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Durbin (D-Ill.), Menendez (D-N.J.) and Sanders (I-Vt.).
Senator Coons is a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which has jurisdiction over laws relating to the use and distribution of consumer information by businesses. He firmly believes that strong consumer data privacy is an issue of civil liberties, because American companies must be able to earn the trust of the consumers whose information they collect and store or risk consumer revolt and, ultimately, non-competitiveness in the market.