[kevincox]

The problem with these standards is that they the operators had little if any incentive to follow them.

Pairing one of these standard with laws would be a powerful solution with good UX.

[Macha]

Lawmakers are generally hestitant to prescribe specific technological implementations because technology moves faster than laws. Imagine if radio spectrum regulations hadn't applied to wifi because they'd specifically specified TV/radio.

[kevincox]

You can do this somewhat abstractly. By saying "when storing user data it must inform the user agent the purposes of that data using a standard mechanism". Then for http you can bless some RFC and the standard way.

But you are right. It isn't ideal.