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A 'brutal choice': The FTC's chairman discusses Google's new privacy policy

A 'brutal choice': The FTC's chairman discusses Google's new privacy policy

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FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz characterized Google's new privacy policy as "a fairly binary and somewhat brutal choice they're giving consumers" during an appearance on C-SPAN's Newsmakers on Sunday.

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He couldn't talk about the details of last year's Google Buzz settlement, but that didn't stop FTC chairman Jon Leibowitz from calling Google's new privacy policy "a fairly binary and somewhat brutal choice that they're giving consumers" on an episode of C-SPAN's Newsmakers on Sunday. The new policy, which goes into effect March 1st, has faced opposition from the EC's Article 29 Working Party — a government group tasked with advising the Commission on data protection, and even a group of 36 US attorneys general. The backlash has even prompted the company to launch an ad campaign explaining what it means to Google's users — in other words, people who use the internet. Leibowitz agrees that Google's been upfront about the changes it's going to make — the question is whether or not being upfront is enough.