Portland, Ore.-Area Cable Agency Asks Comcast to Answer for Privacy Policy

Jun. 26–Portland-area cable regulators pressured Comcast to tighten or justify its privacy policy, which enables the state’s largest cable television company to share confidential information about its customers with a wide range of outsiders.

David Olson, Portland’s top cable regulator, sent Comcast a five-page letter Wednesday afternoon that raised a series of pointed questions from the Mt. Hood Cable Regulatory Commission about the company’s policies on sharing data.

“The commission is dead serious about it,” said Olson, director of Portland’s Office of Cable Communications and Franchise Management, which staffs the commission. “You don’t get a five-page staff letter about something they’re just touching with a feather.”

The commission, which oversees cable service in Multnomah County, is seeking explanations before deciding whether to issue penalties, which could range from fines to recommending that local governments terminate the company’s franchises.

“It was a pretty strong concern for the commission,” Commissioner Irma Valdez said. “For citizens in general, privacy issues are a concern.”

Regulators say Comcast’s privacy policy allows the company more leeway with consumer information than that of AT&T Broadband, which Comcast acquired in November. Philadelphia-based Comcast began including its privacy policies in monthly bills last month.

Comcast’s policy, Olson wrote, “appears to enlarge, rather than limit, the ability of the company to share personally identifiable information” with third parties.

That information includes e-mail addresses, telephone numbers, Social Security numbers, credit card numbers and credit histories.

Comcast, which serves about 540,000 subscribers in Oregon and Southwest Washington, said it issued the new policy to standardize its policies among its 21 million subscribers nationwide.

Comcast viewpoint Gerard Lewis, Comcast’s chief privacy officer, said the new policy simply clarifies customers’ rights. The company, he said, does not sell customer information and does not abuse the data.

“Practices aren’t changing,” Lewis said.

Lewis said Comcast, along with all cable companies, is governed under a strict 1984 federal law that allows it to share customer information without a customer’s consent for a specific set of reasons related to delivering cable service.

“We have designed and drafted our policy to be in full compliance with the law,” Lewis said.

Comcast respects customers’ privacy not only for legal reasons but also for business interests, Lewis said.

“One of the most valuable assets we have is our customer and their trust in us,” he said. “And if you abuse that trust, you lose your customers.”

Comcast also enables customers to stop the company from sharing their names and addresses with third parties that market Comcast services by calling 800-266-2278.

Regulators, however, say Comcast’s policy is broader than AT&T’s and contains fewer privacy safeguards.

AT&T had reserved the right to use its customers’ personal information for service-related purposes such as billing, repair and marketing. Comcast’s policy includes similar rights, but it also says it will use the data “as otherwise necessary to provide the service.”

Comcast’s policy also expands the range of outside companies that could view the data. AT&T’s policy allowed sharing with third parties that helped it market, install and repair cable service. Comcast’s policy also lets the company share the information with a much broader array of outsiders, including “potential business transition partners,”"professional advisors” and “service providers” for “legitimate business activities” related to cable television services.

“Constant vigilance” In the letter, Olson noted that Comcast’s franchise agreement with the governments requires Comcast to “maintain constant vigilance with regard to possible abuses of the right of privacy or other human rights of any subscriber.” Olson asked why Comcast has removed a blanket statement in the AT&T policy that ensured customers’ confidentiality.

The franchise agreement, Olson noted in the letter, also requires customers’ written consent before sharing their information. He asked Comcast to reconcile that requirement with its new policy, which allows information sharing “with or without your written consent.”

Olson said the commission wants to hear Comcast’s explanations before judging whether it has violated its franchises.

“There appears to be a big difference between what the policy says and what the franchise requires them to do,” Olson said in an interview. “It’s very hard for us to see how they’re living up to the franchise requirement based on what we’ve seen so far.”

If the commission notifies Comcast it is violating its franchise, the company would have 30 days to fix the problem, and then the commission could consider fines, which he said probably would be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. It also could recommend termination of franchises with local governments.

Olson said the commission hopes to resolve its concerns by working with Comcast. Olson asked that Comcast respond by July 25, before the commission meets in September.

“We’re not citing violations yet,” Commissioner Richard Goheen said. “We’re trying to work out something agreeable to us and agreeable to them. We don’t need battles to have battles.”

Lewis, who spoke with Olson about the policy last month, said Comcast is reviewing the letter and intends to respond.

Earlier clashes Portland’s cable regulators have not been afraid to brawl with companies over matters of principle.

Olson and his staff were the first in the nation to require cable companies to share their high-speed Internet systems with other service providers. In late 1998, Portland and Multnomah County attempted to require AT&T Broadband to open its network as a condition of its acquisition of the local assets of TCI, the area’s dominant cable provider.

AT&T sued in federal court, which ruled in the regulators’ favor. An appellate court reversed the decision, ruling that AT&T didn’t need to allow other companies onto its network.

But the lawsuits gained national attention, prompting other municipalities to attempt similar requirements.

—–

To see more of The Oregonian, or to subscribe the newspaper, go to http://www.oregonian.com

(c) 2003, The Oregonian, Portland, Ore. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

CMCSK, T,