The Ofcom Consumer Panel (OCP), an independent group that advises Ofcom of consumer interests in the markets it regulates, has warned that people have increasingly widespread concerns about their online privacy and data protection.

The study found that consumers are savvy and switched on users of new technology, but that they fear intrusion into their privacy and don’t trust that their personal data will be protected. Recent concerns over the Phorm (news) system and our governments ability to lose millions of personal records doesn't exactly inspire confidence.

The report also reveals that consumers have little idea about what rules exist to protect their data, and told the Consumer Panel that they felt exposed to others “out there” who they feared could find out too much about them:


People also said they felt under siege from SPAM (junk email) on the phone and the web and they expressed particular concerns about dodgy dates, paedophiles and unscrupulous Internet vendors.

The message is, without exception, that consumer privacy should be heavily protected. It is perhaps a message that some ISPs (Virgin Media, BT), which continue to shun the adoption of an "opt-in" method for Phorm, would do well to heed.