Re: First-Party sets and the potential application of the JournalList trust.txt specification

On Fri, Jan 14, 2022 at 11:28 AM Nick Doty <ndoty@cdt.org> wrote:

> On Thu, Jan 13, 2022 at 2:31 PM Don Marti <dmarti@cafemedia.com> wrote:
>
>>
>> On Thu, Jan 13, 2022 at 9:53 AM Zucker-Scharff, Aram <
>> Aram.Zucker-Scharff@washpost.com> wrote:
>>
>> But I don’t really see how any of this lands us on FPS anyway. There is
>>> no better way to have a clear shared indicator of shared context then
>>> operating on the same domain as far as I can see, and I’m not really clear
>>> on how FPS would give us the ability to enforce any clearer way than
>>> ‘operates on the same domain’ or would otherwise meet the minimum clarity
>>> required to make the affiliation visible to all users. Arguably, even that
>>> isn’t enough to make clear to users what is going on with their data, as it
>>> still leaves them with the mysteries of how these companies operate
>>> internally, but it still is significantly clearer than any other options I
>>> have heard or could conceive. It at least makes it unmistakable who the
>>> operator they have to object to is.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I’m open to hearing some clear articulation of why every business needs
>>> to run on multiple TLDs and that t/f requires FPS… but I haven’t even heard
>>> that yet.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I appreciate the work that has gone into trust.txt but I’m just not sure
>>> why we would want to shave a square peg to fit a round hole when we could
>>> have a round peg made for purpose. I know that in theory this means More
>>> Standards which can be undesirable, but in this case--especially with the
>>> idea that we’re going to have to build some theoretical user-manned
>>> regulatory body that will be reviewing FPSs, a presumably extensive and
>>> never-ending queue--it seems like a new standard for how to proclaim FPSs
>>> that is a best-possible fit is worth the time and effort.
>>>
>>
>> It is possible for FPS to be a net win for users.
>>
>
> I'm interested to understand how this would be a benefit for users, so
> thanks for giving this example to work through.
>
>
>> For example, let's say that dobbsford.example and dobbstoyota.example are
>> two car dealership sites, and users of both are aware of the common brand
>> identity of the two sites. The Bob Dobbs who tells them "Bob Dobbs won't
>> make you pay a lot for a Ford!" and the Bob Dobbs who tells them "Bob Dobbs
>> won't make you pay a lot for a Toyota!" are the same recognizable
>> advertising personality.
>>
>> The two sites have the same design elements, shared copy, and privacy
>> policy text. The two identical privacy policies state that the site will
>> not allow your email address to be used for spam email if you provide it.
>>
>
> What was the user benefit here? As the user, did I want both dealerships
> to know what cars I was looking at on the other site without logging in?
>

As the user, I'm shopping for a car and I want to get a notification when a
car matching my preferences is available for a test drive. (I already
filtered the inventory list on the dobbsford.example site down to the Ford
Focus, and want to see what's similar on the Toyota lot without slogging
through a bunch of unrelated vehicles)

Could be any kind of activity that stays within the same service and
context ("getting a great deal on a car from Bob Dobbs") but spans multiple
domains.

When the sites claim an FPS, the IEE gives them an incentive to adhere to
>> their own published privacy policy. If the IEE makes an account with a
>> spamtrap address on one of the two sites, and then receives spam, the FPS
>> is invalid. The decision to claim an FPS and stick to it is a way for a
>> single service with multiple domains to make a credible commitment to its
>> own privacy policy. FPSs are asking the user for an exception to the normal
>> rule, and offering to pay for the exception with the validation services
>> provided by the IEE.
>>
>
> I'm not clear how in this proposal the FPS is a way for a company to
> commit to its own privacy policy. I'm not precisely sure what redress I
> would have if a company promised not to do something in their privacy
> policy and then did it anyway, but I would expect to reach out to a local
> consumer protection authority -- maybe this is a deceptive trade practice.
> That doesn't seem to rely on their being two different domains that claim
> in a machine-readable way to be owned by the same party. Is the commitment
> more credible because a browser might restrict the scope of cookies if a
> violation of the commitment comes to light and that penalty would be more
> meaningful than what local consumer protection would bring? Or would it be
> similar to a BBB or other trust seal?
>

Yes. Realistically, today a company is not taking much risk by violating
its own privacy policy. (The budget for the entire California Privacy
Protection Agency is $10 million and most US states don't have such an
agency.) The risk of losing an FPS for a violation is a more credible
deterrent -- especially since a violator would lose their FPS worldwide for
a violation in one jurisdiction.


> (I don't know if the two sites in this example actually have the same
>> "ownership". The two dealerships are LLCs with overlapping member lists,
>> and have issued convertible debt instruments to different parties. Bob
>> Dobbs is one step ahead of the IRS, and at least one step ahead of any IEE
>> that tried to figure out the same info.)
>>
>
> I believe you that companies may use complicated arrangements to defraud
> local tax authorities. As a user, I would be very confused if I granted
> special access to combine my data across domains because I thought it was
> the same entity and then it turned out that the data was actually being
> shared by two different companies. That the privacy policy (that I surely
> didn't read) was identical text for the two companies doesn't necessarily
> seem like a big advantage to the end user. Which company should I report to
> the local authority when my email address was shared by one of them for
> spam?
>

If there's no FPS in the picture, you have just as much leverage as you
have with your existing spam. If you do believe that your address was
misused by an FPS member, you forward the spam to the IEE, and they run a
test.

Maybe an IEE would not be necessary if all users had access to regulators
with the time and resources to investigate all violations.

Users are already dealing with a single service or context that spans
multiple "companies" on paper. (Look at web ToS documents that say, if
you're in these countries you have a contract with example.com USA, if
you're in these other countries you have a contract with example.com Ltd.
in Ireland, in these other countries, etc... Real-world company structures
are interesting and probably not feasible for an IEE to analyze.)

Best,
Don


>
> Cheers,
> Nick
>
>>