How To Read A Privacy Policy

The Common Data Project has published a report titled "How to Read a Privacy Policy."

As part of its mission to educate the public on online privacy issues, CDP surveyed the online privacy policies of the largest Internet companies, like Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo, to established online communities and social networks such as Facebook, Craigslist and Wikipedia, as well as a few start‐ups that seek to compete on the basis of privacy, like Cuil and Ixquick.

The report walks through seven questions meant to pinpoint the issues CDP believes are most crucial for a user’s privacy, from questions on how “personal information” is defined to the kind of choices offered to users regarding how their information is shared.