A court in Texas recently dismissed a lawsuit it described as “an aspiring class action against a veritable who’s-who of social media companies.” The Plaintiffs in Opperman v. Path claimed that the Defendants improperly used their smartphone apps to copy, upload, and store Plaintiffs’ address book information without their consent. According to the court, the Plaintiffs’ … Continue Reading
Earlier this week, Twitter appealed a New York state judge’s ruling that required the company to produce an Occupy Wall Street protestor’s tweets, email address, and certain subscriber information. The trial court judge had reasoned that the public nature of Twitter meant that the defendant lacked privacy interests in his tweets and that the government’s … Continue Reading
Privacy stakeholders gathered today at NTIA to once again discuss how the group might move forward in developing a code of conduct for mobile app transparency. While no decisions were made, the group identified a number of topics that would be appropriate to tackle early in the process. There also appeared to be consensus among … Continue Reading
Earlier this week, Wyndham Hotels & Resorts LLC moved to dismiss the complaint filed against it by the Federal Trade Commission in connection with Wyndham’s data security practices, asserting that the FTC has neither the authority nor the expertise to regulate them. As we previously noted, the FTC filed a complaint against Wyndham in June … Continue Reading
Last week, the California legislature passed one of the nation’s most restrictive bills governing law enforcement’s ability to access location information. Under the California Location Privacy Act, state and local government agencies would be required to secure search warrants before obtaining historical or current location information for any electronic device. The California bill would curtail … Continue Reading
Earlier today, the Federal Trade Commission announced a two-week extension for submitting comments on the FTC’s latest proposed revisions to the rule implementing the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (“COPPA”). In place of the original September 10, 2012, deadline, comments will now be accepted until September 24, 2012. The FTC granted the extension after sixteen … Continue Reading
Earlier this month, the federal district court in Minnesota dismissed a lawsuit brought earlier this year by the Minnesota Attorney General (AG) against Accretive Health, Inc., a business associate of hospitals, after the parties reached a settlement. In the lawsuit, which we previously discussed here, the Minnesota AG alleged that the company violated various provisions … Continue Reading
The Smart Grid Consumer Collaborative (SGCC) recently published a fact sheet and released a web video to refute privacy and data security critiques of smart meter technology. SGCC is a non-profit that seeks “to advance the adoption of a reliable, efficient, and secure smart grid.” Its membership includes electric utility and technology companies, universities, government … Continue Reading
The past few years have witnessed a series of attempts by plaintiffs to apply the Video Privacy Protection Act (“VPPA”) — a statute passed in 1988 to protect against certain disclosures of video rental records — to the video distribution technologies of today. For example, in Sterk v. Redbox Automated Retail, plaintiffs sued the video … Continue Reading
A recent surveyof public company directors and general counsel reveals that data security risk is the top legal concern among both key governance groups. According to the 12th annual Law and the Boardroom Study by Corporate Board Member and FTI Consulting, 48% of directors and 55% of general counsel noted data security as their principal … Continue Reading
The Maine Supreme Court recently upheld a state agency’s dismissal of a privacy challenge to the installation of smart meter technology in Maine homes and businesses. Smart meters use wireless technology to collect and transmit data to utility companies about how and when customers use electricity. While smart grid advocates argue that the use of … Continue Reading
An employment background screening company will pay a $2.6 million civil penalty to settle Federal Trade Commission charges under the Fair Credit Reporting Act. The FTC alleged that HireRight Solutions, Inc., which compiles background reports to assist employers in making hiring and other employment-related decisions, is a consumer reporting agency since its reports “bear on … Continue Reading
This week, Facebook and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) have filed amicus curiae briefs in the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals arguing that using Facebook’s “Like” button is speech protected by the First Amendment. The court of appeals is considering whether to overturn a decision by Eastern District of Virginia Judge Raymond A. … Continue Reading
Today the Federal Trade Commission has announced its approval of a consent decree to settle charges that Google misrepresented to users of Apple’s Safari browser that it would not place tracking “cookies” or serve targeted ads to those users, violating an earlier privacy settlement between the company and the FTC. The decree requires Google to pay a … Continue Reading
Yesterday, Microsoft announced that users of Windows 8 and Internet Explorer 10 will have a “first run” option to disable the default “Do Not Track” privacy setting. A first run option occurs during the software set-up process. If users take no action, the DNT setting will be enabled by default. Shortly after the Federal Trade … Continue Reading
The Cyprus Presidency of the Council of the European Union has made clear its objective to achieve a general partial approach on certain articles of the new legislative package on data protection by December 2012, with a view to having the whole legislative package adopted in 2013 or early in 2014. The Cyprus Presidency has … Continue Reading
The UK’s Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) has launched a consultation on proposals to compel suppliers of goods and services to provide consumers access, upon request, to their personal transaction and consumption data in an open standard machine-readable format. The UK Government (UKG) would prefer that the data be supplied at no cost and … Continue Reading
In WEC Carolina Energy Solutions LLC v. Miller, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit recently ruled that a former employee could not be held liable under the federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (“CFAA”), where he lawfully downloaded confidential information from his employer’s computer network and soon thereafter used that information in connection with his … Continue Reading
On August 1, Illinois became the second state in the country to prohibit employers from requesting or requiring employees to provide their passwords for social networking accounts. As reported in this blog, Maryland adopted similar legislation in April. The bill (HB 3782) was signed into law by Illinois Governor Pat Quinn and will become effective on … Continue Reading
As noted in our coverage of the inaugural Privacy Multistakeholder Meeting, NTIA promised to release meeting notes and the results of informal polls taken during the meeting. This information is now available on NTIA’s website, and includes notes in document format and images of the flipcharts used during the meeting. Additionally, NTIA has encouraged stakeholders … Continue Reading
Earlier this morning, the FTC proposed additional revisions to the rule implementing the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (“COPPA”). COPPA governs the online collection, use, and disclosure of children’s personal information by (1) operators of websites and online services that are directed to children under the age of 13 and (2) operators of general audience … Continue Reading
Yesterday, the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee’s subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management held a hearing to consider updates to the Privacy Act of 1974. The Privacy Act of 1974 governs federal government agencies’ collection, use, and transfer of individuals’ personal information. In general, the Act limits federal agencies’ disclosure of such information from … Continue Reading
