California Attorney General Rob Bonta has announced a major settlement under the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), and it will cost Sephora, Inc. a whopping $1.2 million in penalties. Pay attention to your email boxes:  in addition to announcing the Sephora settlement, AG Bonta also said that his office today sent notices to “a number of businesses alleging non-compliance relating to their failure to process consumer opt-out requests made via user-enabled global privacy controls, like the GPC.” 

The central tradeoff between a service’s affordability and the user’s right to privacy has been debated for the better part of two decades. The quickest jolt to the regulatory landscape may come via Federal Trade Commission (“FTC” or the “Commission”) enforcement. On August 11, the FTC issued an Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (“ANPR” or the “Notice”), asking the public to weigh in on whether new regulation is required to protect consumers and crackdown on “commercial surveillance.”

The new California privacy regulatory body, the California Privacy Protection Agency (CPPA), has loudly voiced its opposition to the proposed federal American Data Privacy and Protection Act (ADPPA).   The bottom line for the unanimous opposition:  the ADPPA would preempt California’s privacy laws – both the California Consumer Privacy Act and the California Privacy Rights Act effective as of 1/1/23 – and establishes a ceiling on privacy regulation by states. 

In this post, the Mintz team breaks down the elements within the “American Data Privacy and Protection Act” (ADPPA) bill draft. Released to the public on Friday, June 3, this comprehensive bill touches on all facets of the privacy debate that has been ongoing in Congress for well over 20 years. 

It does not look as though Massachusetts will be state number 6 to enact a comprehensive data privacy law – or at least not the one that people have been talking about.  The Massachusetts Joint Committee on Health Care Financing has voted to send House Bill 4514, An Act Establishing the Massachusetts Information Security and Privacy Act to “study.”  This action by the influential legislative committee signals that this particular bill is not likely to advance during the current legislative session which concludes at the end of the calendar year.

Privacy law 101 includes a simple but important basic concept that organizations may only use personal information they collect for what they say they will, and how they say they will.  According to the Federal Trade Commission ("FTC") and the Department of Justice ("DOJ"), Twitter got this wrong - and it is going to cost Twitter $150M as a result. On May 25, 2022, Twitter reached a proposed settlement with the DOJ and the FTC to resolve allegations that Twitter violated the FTC Act and an Order issued by the FTC in 2011 by misrepresenting how it would make use of users’ personal information, including users’ nonpublic contact information. 

FBI Director Christopher Wray said that agents this summer thwarted a planned attack on Boston Children’s Hospital.  Wray said that the FBI learned of the plan from “an intelligence partner,” and “quick actions by everyone involved, especially at the hospital, protected both the network and the sick kids who depended on it.” 

Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont has signed the country’s fifth comprehensive consumer privacy act. Our breakdown below outlines key concepts on how the Connecticut Data Privacy Act (CDPA) will impact businesses, and several notes about how its provisions compare to other US state privacy laws.