In a move to avoid having their industry subject to more regulation and legislation, a coalition of online advertisers have pledged to support a set of “self-regulatory principles” that will offer greater transparency to consumers about what information in collected about their online activities and how that information is used; the participants also pledged greater transparency and protections for information about children and data that could be used to identify individuals. The broad industry pledge is in part an effort to stave off criticism from privacy advocates, government regulators, and legislators who have criticized the amount of information the industry gathers and shares about Internet users, as well as how long that information is retained.