When it comes to privacy and trust the companies that rank highest in the U.S. include eBay, Verizon and the U.S. Postal Service, according to the Ponemon Institute and Truste.

eBay ranked highest as the “Most Trusted Company for Privacy” because of its ability to protect consumer privacy while managing large amounts of sensitive data. Verizon ranked as the second most trusted company, while the U.S. Postal Service, WebMD, and IBM rounded out the top five.

Verizon and the U.S. Postal service became the first telecommunications and government organizations, respectively, to make it into the top three. Facebook made its first ever appearance in the top 10, signifying its commitment to implementing privacy practices that are approved by both their user community and privacy experts.

“Year in and year out our Most Trusted Companies for Privacy study is a fascinating snapshot of public sentiment toward business, and the overall drop of financial services organizations in 2009 continues that trend,” said Dr. Larry Ponemon, chairman and founder, Ponemon Institute.

“With the banking industry at the center of a national financial crisis, it’s no surprise to see a loss of trust reflected in the rankings of even those top performers on this list. Meanwhile, the continued strong showing of e-businesses such as eBay, WebMD, Yahoo!, and Facebook seems to demonstrate consumers’ growing comfort with doing business online.”

Posted on Friday, September 18th, 2009 at 12:21 pm. Permalink