When consumers provide personal information for a product or service, the assumption is the receiving company will exercise due diligence to protect their information. Bear in mind there is no all-purpose federal law mandating personal data should be protected, only certain industry-specific laws, for example, health care and financial. But even without an overarching mandate, most companies will attempt to protect your personal data just to avoid a charge of negligence should a privacy breach occur.

One nonprofit organization that monitors how well companies guard personal dataamong other missionsis the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). EFFs purpose is to defend free speech, privacy, innovation, and consumer rights. This lab takes a look at a class-action lawsuit filed by EFF.

Instruction

In this lab, you will explain the privacy issues related to an EFF case study, you will identify U.S. privacy law violations and their implications, and you will assess the impact of those violations on consumer confidential information.

Related Document: Download and review the attached document before you get started:

Case Study on Issues Related to Sharing Consumers Confidential Information [MS-Word, File Size 15 KB]

Deliverables:

In your Lab Report File, you will include the following:

    Explain the mission statement of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).
    Relate privacy issues in the case study to any personal or individual laws in the United States.
    Identify U.S. citizen privacy law violations and their implications for privacy and confidential information in the case study.
    Assess the impact of these violations on consumers confidential information from a legal, ethical, and information systems security perspective