This fall, online privacy debates have been heating up in Washington. Tomorrow, the Federal Trade Commission will finally deliver its long awaited online privacy report. Chairman. Over the past year FTC has explored new online privacy frameworks and examined the strength of cloud computing privacy in a series of privacy roundtables.

The FTC has issued a privacy advisory for tomorrow, stating that FTC chairman Jon Leibowitz, Jessica Rich, deputy director of the Bureau of Consumer Protection, and Edward W. Felten, the FTC’s new chief technologist, will answer reporters’ questions “about a new FTC report on privacy that outlines a framework for consumers, businesses and policymakers.”

This FTC online privacy report will be one of the most important government assessments this year. Look for widespread reaction to its contents across industry and technology media. Particular attention likely be paid to two events here in Washington:

First, David Vladeck, the FTC’s director of the Bureau of Consumer Protection Protection, will speak tomorrow at Consumer Watchdog’s policy conference on the future of online consumer protections. You can watch live here (if you can stream Windows Media files.)

Second, House of Representatives will hold a hearing on “Do-Not-Track legislation, which would consider whether citizens should be able to opting of from Web tracking

Will online privacy look different by the end of the day? As Jamie Court, Author, President of Consumer Watchdog, wrote in the Huffington Post:

There are few issues 9 out of 10 Americans agree on. A Consumer Watchdog poll shows that 90% of Americans agree it is important to protect their privacy online. 86% want a “make me anonymous” button and 80% want the creation of a “do not track me” list online that would be administered by the Federal Trade Commission.

The release of the FTC online privacy report also comes with a new media twist: According to @FTCGov, the agency’s Twitter account, the nation’s top regulator will also host its first Twitter chat at 3 PM. It remains to be seen how civil citizens are in the famously snarky medium. The agency has suggested the #FTCpriv hashtag to aggregate tweets. UPDATE: Although the White House OpenGov account and FTC tweeted on Wednesday that the chat would be at #FTCpriv hashtag, not #FTCpriv, the chat ended up being at the original hashtag.

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