EBay's website includes both a general overview of its privacy policy and a page containing the full details of the policy. Junkbusters Corporation, based in New Jersey, has complained about this style of layout before. Jason Catlett, President of Junkbusters, describes eBay's policy as deceptive.
He argues in the letter to the FTC that the summary "oversimplifies and makes material omissions, giving the visitor a sense of privacy that is beyond what eBay says in the long version that it provides."
As an example, the letter states:
"For example, the short version, after deleting some explanatory embellishments, comes down to: 'Your information will be shared with third parties... ...only when absolutely necessary... Third parties are not permitted to ... disclose it ... without your consent.' The phrase 'absolutely necessary' sounds reassuring and prudently strict, but in the long version it is weakened to 'as we in our sole discretion believe necessary or appropriate...'"
Catlett contends that this is an important case because the use of "layered privacy policy" is becoming popular with large companies. He says that: "The style need not be inherently bad if the short version is representative of the long version, but if the format degenerates into an unfunny 'good news, bad news' joke, as it does in eBay's case, it is deceptive and should not be tolerated."
In response, eBay's spokesman Kevin Pursglove told Computerworld: "The only deception here is the deception that there are two documents. The summary is exactly that: a summary."