The California legislature has approved a contingency plan to ensure that certain California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”) exemptions will be extended beyond December 2020.  Regardless of what happens with the November ballot initiative, businesses will have at least another year before they must comply with all of the CCPA’s provisions when collecting or using certain employment- or business-to-business related personal information, as long as the legislation is signed by the California governor.

As we previously explained, the CCPA’s exemptions for employment-related data and data collected in the context of business-to-business transactions and communications are currently set to expire on January 1, 2021.  If the California Privacy Rights Act is approved by California voters in November, it will automatically extend those exemptions until January 1, 2023.  But in the event that the ballot initiative fails, the California legislature has put in place a backup plan: AB 1281, which will extend the employment and business-to-business exemptions until January 1, 2022.  If the ballot initiative passes, however, the CPRA’s longer extension until 2023 will supersede AB 1281.

The bill will now be enrolled and sent to the governor for approval.