Jeff Chester

Jeff Chester is the executive director of the Center for Digital Democracy (CDD), a Washington, D.C. non-profit. CDD’s mission is to foster democratic expression and consumer protection in the digital media era. His book, Digital Destiny: New Media and the Future of Democracy provides an in-depth examination on the threats to the public interest from both old and new media consolidation. Bill Moyers has called Chester the "Paul Revere" of the media reform movement.

A former investigative reporter and filmmaker, Chester has been engaged in public interest policy advocacy for more than three decades. In the 1980s, he helped direct the successful campaign to establish the Independent Television Service (ITVS) for public TV. In the 1990’s, he co-founded the Center for Media Education, spearheading a effort that led to passage of the 1998 Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) and rules requiring children's educational programming for broadcasting. In 1996, Newsweek magazine named Jeff Chester one of the Internet's fifty most influential people. He was named a Stern Foundation “Public Interest Pioneer” in 2001. Jeff played a key role in organizing the grassroots opposition to the FCC’s proposed media ownership rules in 2003. Under his leadership, CDD has pressed the FTC and other policymakers to address how new digital marketing practices threaten privacy and consumer welfare. He has been a author of a series of reports exposing threats from online marketing, including practices involving finance, health, and children. He was named the 2011 “Domestic Privacy Champion” by the Electronic Privacy Information Center.