Cellular carriers have gained the chance to offload some regulatory compliance...

privacy notices and managing information about consents, as users look more and more to app stores for those functions, said Michael Altschul, CTIA’s general counsel. Custody of data and responsibility for them need to be negotiated among the players in the new mobile universe, he said at a Law Seminars International program in San Francisco. One company might handle dealing with customers and another with law enforcers in this connection, Altschul said late Tuesday. Providers of operating systems and applications will have to help network operators shoulder the burden to maintain service reliability and security, he said. “Most of us” in telecom law “have never had to worry much about the Federal Trade Commission, because there’s something called the common-carrier exception” to the jurisdiction provided in its authorizing statute, Altschul said. But wireless operators haven’t been classified as common carriers, and the FTC is eagerly asserting jurisdiction over them, he said. “How to balance user-friendliness with true data security will be the challenge” in policymaking about protecting information regarding users, Altschul said. His general conclusion: “Don’t get stuck looking in the rear-view mirror. Try to start looking ahead of the headlights.”