223: Tech for Good: Consumer Reports' Fight for Digital Consumer Rights

I sit down with two innovation leaders from one of America's oldest and most trusted consumer brands. Leah Fischman Hunter, Director of the Innovation Lab, and Ginny Fahs, Director of Product R&D at Consumer Reports, join me to unpack how a 90-year-old nonprofit is building modern tools for an online world filled with AI hype, dark patterns, and data brokers.

I share a personal connection at the top. In 2004, I helped launch Consumer Reports WebWatch in the press, when most sites hid executive names, contact details, and return policies. That early effort to bring transparency to the Internet in the 1990s is why this episode matters so much to me.

Two decades later, the stakes are even higher, with scams in our inboxes, consent buried in legalese, and AI systems shaping what we see and buy. CR has always had our backs and I wanted you to hear how they are doing it again.

Leah and Ginny explain how Consumer Reports blends advocacy with product building. Their team translates privacy laws into something people can actually use. We dig into Permission Slip, a free app that lets you reclaim your data and tell companies to stop selling it. We discuss the reality of an opt-out culture in the United States, why people feel powerless regarding data, and how CR's independence and mission enable it to prioritize the public interest. We also explore Ask CR, an advisor grounded in tested ratings and reporting, rather than ads or affiliate commissions.

We zoom out to the bigger shift happening with AI. I raise the worry that conversational agents often deliver a single definitive answer, while consumers still need choice and transparency. Leah and Ginny describe early work with academic partners on pro-consumer agentic systems and what duty of care and duty of loyalty could look like in software built for people, not just profits. We explore why online evidence needs clearer authorship, how to consider deleting data from platforms you rely on, and where education must catch up quickly.

If you care about your privacy, your wallet, and the truth behind the products you buy, this one is for you. You will walk away with a clearer picture of what rights you already have, how to exercise them without hiring a lawyer, and why organizations like Consumer Reports still matter when technology moves faster than the rules that govern it.