Given the divide in America, it’s truly been remarkable how much we have accomplished together in 2018. Below's just some of what we accomplished in 2018, and you can also watch this short highlights video about our victories.

The nation’s toughest online privacy law:  A new California law requires that companies tell you what information they collect about you, give you the right to say no, and are legally accountable for data breaches.

LOS ANGELES, CA – Consumer Watchdog today joined the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) and six other consumer groups in calling on the Federal Trade Commission to investigate the misleading and manipulative tactics of Google and Facebook in steering users to “consent” to privacy-invasive default settings.

LOS ANGELES – The 5-0 vote today by the California Senate’s Judiciary Committee to move a compromise privacy bill forward was a significant step toward ensuring Californian’s privacy, Consumer Watchdog said.

The bill, AB 375, may not be as strong as the California Consumer Privacy Act ballot initiative it is intended to replace, but for the first time gives consumers substantial control over their personal information and provides a right of private action for people to bring a suit if there is a data breach, the nonpartisan nonprofit public interest group said.

Privacy is a right enshrined in the California Constitution.  The only problem is that there are few laws and regulations in place to actually protect our privacy, particularly when it involves the use of our personal information online.

Much of the criticism of Mark Zuckerberg's testimony in Congress from the public and the media alike was leveled at members of Congress for asking supposedly stupid questions rather than at Mark Zuckerberg for his disingenuous responses. "Congress doesn't understand Facebook," claimed Dylan Byers of CNN.

LOS ANGELES – Consumer Watchdog today called on tech giants Google, Comcast, AT&T and Verizon to follow Facebook’s lead and drop their opposition to a California privacy ballot initiative.  The not-for-profit group called on Mark Zuckerberg – as an individual -- to become the public face of the campaign as the poster child for how privacy problems can go awry even when you think you have a handle on them.

LOS ANGELES – Consumer Watchdog today called on Congress to enact legislation that would protect consumers’ online privacy and not merely facilitate Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s latest public-relations-driven apology tour.

“Facebook has a longtime record of violating privacy, making a show of apologizing, and then going forward to invade privacy again,” said John M. Simpson, Consumer Watchdog’s Privacy and Technology Project director. “Hearings aren’t enough, unless Congress simply wants to be an enabler for Zuckerberg’s continued abuses.”

LOS ANGELES, CA – Consumer Watchdog today joined a coalition of more than 20 leading U.S. child advocacy, consumer, and privacy groups in filing a complaint asking the Federal Trade Commission to investigate and sanction Google for violating the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) in operating the popular video platform, YouTube.

SANTA MONICA, CA – Consumer Watchdog today challenged Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to put his money where his mouth is and help fund a California privacy ballot initiative and also tell the social platform’s users if they were among the 50 million people whose data was breached.

SANTA MONICA, CA – Consumer Watchdog today joined Privacy International and other public interest groups in an international call for car rental companies to protect the privacy of driver and passenger data their rented vehicles collect.

“Today’s cars are little more than rolling computers that amass huge amounts of information,” said John M. Simpson, Consumer Watchdog’s Privacy and Technology Project Director.  “When you rent a car, you must have the right to control how that extremely revealing data is used.”