Re: Issue 25: Possible exemption for research purposes covered by conditions for outsourcing and issue 34: Exemption for aggregated data

On Feb 6, 2012, at 8:49 AM, Kathy Joe wrote:
> Opt back in for panel members who have DNT - see 4.3.1: how should a tracking reference interact with user over-rides of the tracking compliance, Issue 27: How should the “opt-back in”mechanism be designed?
> 
> Description: Research panel member eg Suppress DNT because there is a contractual agreement with the user (ie users have a pre-existing agreement to be tracked)
> 
> Panel Members are individual users that have expressed the desire to be part of a research study and/or group as part of a behavioral tracking research program which would need to over-ride the DNT standard. We introduce this to distinguish it from a site-specific exemption which may represent a desire/preference whereas a panel member relationship represents a contractual obligation with the research organization that may cover different domains.
> 
Could we design our opt-back-in mechanism so that research doesn't override the DNT preference but rather members of research panels register an exception with their user agent and specifically opt in to tracking by the researcher? (This might be a reason to standardize on an interface to request Web-wide exceptions.)

For example, a research panel member might want to turn off even the panel tracking briefly while researching a medical condition; turning on DNT in that situation seems like a good recommendation for the user.

—Nick