Privacy Less Controversial Than Piracy? For Now, Web Giants Don’t Sound the Alarm on EU Data Protection.

Internet companies are less up in arms about another proposed bill, this time about a unified approach to online privacy in the European Union. Some initial reactions to the proposal, which was pre-announced at the DLD conference in Munich and then published on Jan 25, were harshly critical. But now that European Commissioner Viviane Reding has formally proposed her legislation, Web companies seemed more measured in their response. Though they didn’t endorse the bill, they seemed willing to work with it. Of course, they’d prefer to avoid walking into fines of up to two percent of their revenue.