Privacy & Cybersecurity

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Retailers: Review Those Checkout Practices - Again

July 26, 2017 | Blog | By Cynthia Larose

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie has signed the Personal Information Privacy and Protection Act (we can now add #PIPPA to the alphabet soup of privacy acronyms.....), which limits the ability of retailers to collect PII scanned from customer driver's licenses and identification cards and restricts the usage of any PII collected for the purposes identified in the Act.
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Court Holds Crime Policy Covers Business Email Compromise (BEC) Loss

July 24, 2017 | Blog | By Nancy Adams, Cynthia Larose

The "business compromise email" is what the FBI calls the "$5 billion scam," but apparently an insurance company did not agree with an insured company that they had been the victim of a crime.
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FTC Reaffirms that IoT Devices Must Comply with COPPA

July 20, 2017 | Blog

The Internet of Things (“IoT”) can be thought of as a group of different devices that can communicate with each other, perhaps over a network such as the internet. We have written extensively about many of the privacy challenges that IoT devices can create.
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Five Questions for Investors in Insurtech

July 11, 2017 | Blog | By Cynthia Larose

Decisions you make when founding and/or investing in an insurtech venture can dictate your regulatory obligations, tax liability, operational structure and, ultimately, profitability.
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Knock, Knock, Knocking on Menon’s Door

July 6, 2017 | Blog | By John Koss

In a decision sure to have wide-ranging implications for cross-border discovery and governing privacy regimes, the Supreme Court recently held in Water Splash, Inc. v. Menon, that the Convention on the Service Abroad of Judicial and Extrajudicial Documents in Civil and Commercial Matters (the “Hague Service Convention” or the “Convention”) does not prohibit service by mail. 
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Oregon Ramps up State Consumer Protections in an Era of Deregulation

June 28, 2017 | Blog | By Cynthia Larose

Oregon’s legislature recently expanded the scope of statutory consumer protections by passing a bill to amend the state’s Unlawful Trade Practices Act (the “Act”). Recently, Oregon’s Governor Kate Brown signed H.B. 2090 into law after near unanimous passage by state lawmakers.
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Going Down For A Third Time – Barnes & Noble Consumer Data Breach Claims Are Dismissed Again for Lack of Injury

June 16, 2017 | Blog | By Kevin McGinty

Despite some courts’ evident confusion about the impact of payment card theft on consumer cardholders, other courts are getting it right. Just this week, a judge in the Northern District of Illinois issued an order dismissing the second amended complaint filed by consumer cardholders in In re Barnes & Noble Pin Pad Litig. (N.D. Ill.). 
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US-CERT Encourages Companies to Act on FBI Guidance to Protect Email Systems

June 2, 2017 | Blog

Recently the United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT), an organization within the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) National Protection and Programs Directorate (NPPD) and a branch of the Office of Cybersecurity and Communications’ (CS&C) National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center (NCCIC), encouraged users and administrators to review a recent article from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) regarding Building a Digital Defense with an Email Fortress.
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Target Reaches $18.5 Million Dollar Settlement in Data Breach with States

May 25, 2017 | Blog | By Wynter Deagle, Cynthia Larose

It seems as though we have been writing about this case for a lifetime. Target Corporation’s data breach saga came one step closer to a conclusion this week. On Tuesday, Target reached an $18.5 million settlement with 47 states and the District of Columbia to resolve the states’ investigation into the company’s 2013 data breach.
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May 2017 TCPA Digest

May 24, 2017 | Blog | By Cynthia Larose

This month's issue features updates on the latest regulatory activities and an article on a potential ruling that could have major implications for pending and future TCPA cases.
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HIPAA Spring Check-up: Your Obligations to Safeguard Third-Party Patient Health Information in medical records produced in litigation

May 23, 2017 | Blog | By John Koss

You’ve had your apple a day, but you can’t keep the subpoenas away…  
And, if your organization is facing a request seeking records or other materials that may contain patient health information (“PHI”), it bears repeating that while HIPAA provides a number of methods through which covered entities that hold records containing PHI may produce such records, these guidelines are closely enforced by courts.
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#MLWashingtonCyberWatch: The Cybersecurity Executive Order (at last)

May 18, 2017 | Blog | By Cynthia Larose, Joanne Dynak, Michael Katz

Amid the flurry following former FBI Director James Comey’s firing last week, President Trump marked his 111th day in office on Thursday, May 11th by signing an executive order targeting national cybersecurity.
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Yesterday, #WannaCry. Today, #DocuSignPhish

May 16, 2017 | Blog | By Cynthia Larose

Another day, another data incident. If you use DocuSign, you'll want to pay attention.
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Global Ransomware Attack Update

May 15, 2017 | Blog | By Cynthia Larose

We've been following the latest on the WannaCry ransomware attack that we first told you about over the weekend.
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WannaCry Ransomware Attack Updates -- Europol Says "Patch Before Monday"

May 14, 2017 | Blog | By Cynthia Larose, Dianne Bourque

By now, you may have heard about the global ransomware attacks affecting organizations throughout the world. Estimates range from between 150,000 to 200,000 groups in nearly 150 countries, and those numbers could be higher.
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#MLWashingtonCyberWatch: Trump Administration Restricts Privacy Rights for Non-US Citizens

May 3, 2017 | Blog | By Cynthia Larose

In another example of increased restriction on the rights of non-U.S. Citizens, last week the Department of Homeland Security (“DHS”) published a policy memorandum limiting the privacy rights of immigrants and foreign nationals under the Federal Privacy Act of 1974. 
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Appeal in Home Depot Data Breach Derivative Action Results in Settlement of Corporate Governance Claims

May 2, 2017 | Blog | By Kevin McGinty

Snatching victory of a sort from the jaws of defeat, shareholders who brought a derivative action alleging that the 2014 Home Depot data breach resulted from officers’ and directors’ breaches of fiduciary duties have reached a settlement of those claims.
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Two HIPAA Mistakes Lead to Fines from OCR

May 1, 2017 | Blog

It was a busy April for the Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) (see our prior post on a settlement from earlier in April). On April 20, OCR announced a Resolution Agreement with Center for Children’s Digestive Health, S.C. (“CCDH”) related to CCDH’s failure to enter into a business associate agreement with a paper medical records storage vendor. 
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From the CISO Corner: Your Most Important Security Relationship

April 28, 2017 | Blog | By Cynthia Larose

Today's Guest Post courtesy of Bill Kyrouz, Mintz Levin's CISO:
Have you come to the conclusion that you need a Managed Security Services Provider (MSSP) to support your small to medium sized enterprise but don’t know where to start?
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Kimpton Data Breach Decision Highlights Lingering Confusion on Standing Issues

April 21, 2017 | Blog | By Kevin McGinty

When data thieves steal payment card data, consumers suffer no legally cognizable injuries. Card issuers absorb the fraudulent charges and replace the affected cards.  Because fraudulent charges are not billed to consumers, they do not show up on consumers’ credit reports or otherwise affect their credit ratings. 
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