Data brokers have been a known problem for long enough that the conversation about them has calcified into a predictable shape: journalists write the exposé, the company in question says something about industry practices and consumer choice, regulators express concern, nothing material changes. The cycle completes every eighteen months or so and we start again.
The reason nothing changes is not ignorance. The major data brokers — Acxiom, LexisNexis, Experian’s data business, the dozen smaller ones — are well understood by the people in a position to regulate them. The reason is structural. Data brokers serve industries that have significant lobbying power: insurance, financial services, background screening, direct marketing. The value proposition is clear and the customers are sophisticated. Regulatory pressure that would meaningfully constrain the data broker ecosystem would also constrain their customers, and those customers have resources to push back.
The opt-out regime that exists in most US states is not a solution. It’s a release valve. The process is deliberately difficult, the opt-outs don’t persist across company acquisitions, and the companies are not required to verify that the opt-out applies to all their downstream data products. A person who diligently opts out of every major data broker they can identify has reduced their exposure in ways that are meaningful at the margin but hasn’t actually removed themselves from the data economy.
What would actually change things is a data minimization requirement — a rule that says you can only collect and retain personal data that is necessary for a specific stated purpose, with enforcement that has real teeth. The EU’s GDPR has this in principle; the enforcement has been inconsistent, but the legal framework exists. The US doesn’t have an equivalent at the federal level, and the state-by-state patchwork isn’t a substitute.
In the meantime: the opt-out services are worth using, the major brokers are worth opting out of directly, and maintaining a clear-eyed view of what that does and doesn’t accomplish is the most honest starting point.
Doug Alexander 