The Trump administration is talking to Facebook and Google about potential rules for online privacy

The Trump administration is crafting a proposal to protect Web users’ privacy, aiming to blunt global criticism that the absence of strict federal rules in the United States has enabled data mishaps at Facebook and others in Silicon Valley. Over the past month, the Commerce Department has been huddling with representatives of tech giants such as Facebook and Google, Internet providers including AT&T and Comcast, and consumer advocates, apparently.

The government’s goal is to release an initial set of ideas this fall that outlines Web users’ rights, including general principles for how companies should collect and handle consumers’ private information. The forthcoming blueprint could then become the basis for Congress to write the country’s first wide-ranging online-privacy law, an idea the White House recently has said it could endorse. "Through the White House National Economic Council, the Trump Administration aims to craft a consumer privacy protection policy that is the appropriate balance between privacy and prosperity,” said Lindsay Walters, the president’s deputy press secretary. “We look forward to working with Congress on a legislative solution consistent with our overarching policy.”