[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 54 (Thursday, May 4, 2000)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E652]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




             THE CONSUMER FINANCIAL PRIVACY ACT--H.R. 4380

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. JOHN J. LaFALCE

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                         Thursday, May 4, 2000

  Mr. LaFALCE. Mr. Speaker, I am today introducing legislation to 
enhance the financial privacy rights of all Americans. This 
legislation, the ``Consumer Financial Privacy Act,'' implements the 
privacy protections that were announced by President Clinton earlier 
this week. I am pleased to be joined in sponsoring this legislation by 
Mr. Dingell, ranking member of the Committee on Commerce, Mr. Markey, 
Mr. Frank, Mr. Kanjorski, and many other of my House colleagues.
  Individual privacy is one of the most important issues before the 
Congress and an issue of urgent concern for the American people. 
Clearly everyone should have the right to be left alone if they choose, 
or to be confident that their financial, medical and other personal 
information will not be disclosed, sold, or used without their consent.
  We live in a world of electronic communications in which intimate 
details of every individual's financial and private life can be 
instantaneously transmitted anywhere around the world. This imposes a 
far greater responsibility on government to protect individual privacy 
more than ever before. And it is a responsibility that I believe 
government must fully exercise.
  Last year the House enacted significant financial privacy protections 
as part of broader financial modernization legislation. While these 
privacy proposals were given little chance for passage a year earlier 
when I first introduced them, they were adopted by the House with an 
overwhelming 427-to-1 vote. These financial privacy protections were 
significant, going well beyond the limited protections in existing law 
for financial transactions, and well beyond the protections available 
for most other consumer transactions.
  But we never intended last year's legislation to be the ultimate 
solution on financial privacy, it was only a first step. While it 
provided important notice and opt-out protections to prevent the 
selling or sharing of private information among unaffiliated companies, 
it failed to extend the same protection for information shared between 
a financial institution and its affiliates. While it prohibited the 
selling of credit card and account information for marketing, it did 
not provide a higher level of protection for other sensitive 
information such as medical or health records or information about 
payments and transactions. Democrats were united in attempting to add 
these additional protections to the legislation on the House floor and 
again in conference. Unfortunately, we were not successful.
  The legislation outlined by President Clinton on April 30, 2000, 
which we are introducing today, completes the promise of that previous 
effort, and takes another gigantic step toward achieving an absolute 
right of financial privacy for all Americans. It extends the principles 
of notice and opt-out for all information shared between a financial 
institution and all affiliated companies. It provides a higher level of 
protection, an ``opt in'' requirement, for sensitive medical and 
health-related information that could affect financial decisions, as 
well as for individualized information describing spending habits or 
transactions.
  The bill creates new rights for consumers to find out what 
information is being collected about them by their financial 
institution and to correct or delete inaccurate or outdated 
information. It requires timely disclosure of an institution's privacy 
policies to permit consumers to comparison shop among financial service 
providers that offer the best protections. And it makes these private 
protections fully enforceable by augmenting the enforcement authority 
of the Federal Trade Commission and by permitting State Attorneys 
General to bring legal actions on behalf of state residents to prevent 
violations.
  Mr. Speaker, I believe this is balanced and reasonable legislation 
that is the product of months of careful consideration. It is 
legislation that the American people clearly want and deserve. I invite 
my colleagues on both sides of the aisle who believe that every 
American has a right to their personal privacy to join with me in 
supporting this important and much needed legislation.

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