Privacy & Cybersecurity

Labor Day is passed, and the Privacy & Security Matters blog is back after a bit of a hiatus.    The California State Legislature was busy up to the last day of the session working on privacy legislation.

The Federal Communications Commission (“FCC” or “Commission”) is busy evaluating scores of comments and reply comments it received in several ongoing TCPA proceedings in the past month.

After the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia released its highly anticipated decision in ACA International v. Federal Communications Commission, courts have been addressing issues raised in that case. We previously summarized the opinion — which raises four issues, one of which is what constitutes an Automatic Telephone Dialing System (“ATDS”).

The European Parliament passed a resolution today strongly criticizing Privacy Shield and recommending that Privacy Shield be suspended as of September 1, 2018, if the US doesn’t shape up by that deadline.  Should US companies that rely on Privacy Shield panic?

The Supreme Court ruled, at the end of June, that seizing cell-site location information—data that tracks cell phone users’ movements—constitutes a search under the Fourth Amendment.

In its most recent Cybersecurity Newsletter, OCR focuses on the intersection of HIPAA and information security.  To be sure, HIPAA requires covered entities and business associates to address their organizations’ information security.

June 28, 2018 will be a watershed day in the history of U.S. data privacy legislation.   California has become the first state to move away from the U.S. approach of legislating data privacy in slow bits.  

Manufacturers of wireless devices used for Internet of Things (IoT) applications should take heed of new Trump Administration proposals aimed at reducing the cybersecurity threats from botnets and other automated and distributed attacks.

In the latest decision concerning standing in data breach cases, the Fourth Circuit has vacated a district court’s dismissal and reinstated putative class action data breach litigation against the National Board of Examiners in Optometry Inc. (“NBEO”).

Earlier this week, I moderated a panel discussion at an event hosted by the New York chapter of the Health Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS). The panel was comprised of private sector health information technology and security experts and was tasked with discussing challenges related to the interoperability and security of health information systems.

The Federal Communications Commission (“FCC”) is reconsidering several issues central to TCPA liability, including what equipment constitutes an automatic telephone dialing system ((“ATDS”) and who the “called party” is when a wireless number has been reassigned.

Our previous post discussed the decision in Marshall v. CBE Group, Inc., which completely rejected the FCC’s broad interpretation of an ATDS and found in favor of the defendant. Since then, another district court in the Ninth Circuit has followed suit, but three others in the Eleventh Circuit have concluded that the FCC’s 2003 Order survives ACA Int’l. It could behoove some TCPA defendants to seek stays while this circuit split is sorted out or until after the FCC clarifies its position on the ATDS issue following ACA Int’l.

The Federal Communications Commission (“FCC”) is reconsidering several issues central to TCPA liability, including what equipment constitutes an automatic telephone dialing system (“ATDS”) and who the “called party” is when a wireless number has been reassigned.

Recently, a new bill was signed by Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper, creating far reaching new requirements for entities that collect or maintain personal identifying information of Colorado residents. These requirements, which will create one of the strictest state based privacy and data breach laws in the country, will go into effect September 1, 2018. 

The May 2018 cyber security newsletter from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights (OCR) focused on a topic often overlooked by covered entities and their business associates: physical security.

If you glance at the “countdown clock” in the left hand sidebar of our blog, you’ll see that it has reached 00:00:00. GDPR Day is here. But, unlike Y2K (for those of you old enough to remember the near-hysteria), 25 May 2018 is only the beginning of the GDPR compliance road and not a “completion date.”

We are now in the 10-day countdown to the GDPR enforcement date that we’ve been talking about since 2015. If you are a charter member of Procrastinators Anonymous, or just secretly hoped that this would all go away, the sands in the hourglass are running low.

On April 23, the FCC and FTC hosted a joint expo aimed at stopping illegal robocalls through technological solutions. The expo showcased innovative technologies, devices, and applications that minimize or eliminate the number of illegal robocalls consumers receive. The expo was held one month after the FCC and FTC’s Joint Policy Forum on fighting illegal robocalls, and in between the Senate Commerce and House Energy & Commerce Committee hearings on the same topic.

As we wrote in a previous post, on March 16, 2018 the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit released its highly anticipated decision in ACA International v. Federal Communications Commission. Among other things, the DC Circuit set aside the Commission’s explanation of which devices qualified as Automatic Telephone Dialing Systems under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act. Though the decision has been out for less than two months, courts in the Ninth Circuit have taken notice.

The North American Numbering Council (NANC), a federal advisory committee established by the FCC, delivered a call authentication report to the FCC on May 3. The report was developed by the Call Authentication Trust Anchor Working Group (CATA WG) and approved by NANC on April 27. It “details a framework for call authentication that can more quickly be established than various alternatives, while obtaining the broadest participation of industry.”