Recently, the UK Information Commissioner’s Office (“ICO”) fined credit rating agency Equifax £500,000 for failing to protect the personal data of up to 15 million UK individuals. The data was compromised during a cyber attack that occurred between May 13 and July 30, 2017, which affected 146 million customers globally. Although Equifax’s systems in the U.S. were targeted, the ICO found the credit agency’s UK arm, Equifax Ltd, failed to take appropriate steps to ensure that its parent firm, which processed this data on its behalf, had protected the information. The ICO investigation uncovered a number of serious contraventions of the UK Data Protection Act 1998 (the “DPA”), resulting in the ICO imposing on Equifax Ltd the maximum fine available. Continue Reading UK ICO Fines Equifax for 2017 Breach

Effective September 21, 2018, Section 301 of the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act (the “Act”) requires consumer reporting agencies to provide free credit freezes and year-long fraud alerts to consumers throughout the country. Under the Act, consumer reporting agencies must each set up a webpage designed to enable consumers to request credit freezes, fraud alerts, extended fraud alerts and active duty fraud alerts. The webpage must also give consumers the ability to opt out of the use of information in a consumer report to send the consumer a solicitation of credit or insurance. Consumers may find links to these webpages on the Federal Trade Commission’s Identity Theft website.

The Act also enables parents and guardians to freeze their children’s credit if they are under age 16. Guardians or conservators of incapacitated persons may also request credit freezes on their behalf.

Section 302 of the Act provides additional protections for active duty military. Under this section, consumer reporting agencies must offer free electronic credit monitoring to all active duty military.

For more information, read the FTC’s blog post.

On August 30, 2018, Apple Inc. announced a June update to its App Store Review Guidelines that will require each developer to provide its privacy policy as part of the app review process, and to include in such policy specific content requirements. Effective October 3, 2018, all new apps and app updates must include a link to the developer’s privacy policy before they can be submitted for distribution to users through the App Store or through TestFlight external testing. Continue Reading Apple to Require Privacy Policies for All New Apps and App Updates

As reported in BNA Privacy Law Watch, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (the “OPC”) is seeking public comment on recently released guidance (the “Guidance”) intended to assist organizations with understanding their obligations under the federal breach notification mandate, which will take effect in Canada on November 1, 2018.  Continue Reading Canadian Regulator Seeks Public Comment on Breach Reporting Guidance

On September 7, 2018, the New Jersey Attorney General announced a settlement with data management software developer Lightyear Dealer Technologies, LLC, doing business as DealerBuilt, resolving an investigation by the state Division of Consumer Affairs into a data breach that exposed the personal information of car dealership customers in New Jersey and across the country. The breach occurred in 2016, when a researcher exposed a gap in the company’s security and gained access to unencrypted files containing names, addresses, social security numbers, driver’s license numbers, bank account information and other data belonging to thousands of individuals, including at least 2,471 New Jersey residents. Continue Reading Software Company Settles with New Jersey AG Over Data Breach

On September 4, 2018, the Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (“NIST”) announced a collaborative project to develop a voluntary privacy framework to help organizations manage privacy risk. The announcement states that the effort is motivated by innovative new technologies, such as the Internet of Things and artificial intelligence, as well as the increasing complexity of network environments and detail of user data, which make protecting individuals’ privacy more difficult. “We’ve had great success with broad adoption of the NIST Cybersecurity Framework, and we see this as providing complementary guidance for managing privacy risk,” said Under Secretary of Commerce for Standards and Technology and NIST Director Walter G. Copan. Continue Reading NIST Launches Privacy Framework Effort

On September 5, 2018, the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California held that a class action arising from a 2016 Uber Technologies Inc. (“Uber”) data breach must proceed to arbitration. The case was initially filed after a 2016 data breach that affected approximately 600,000 Uber drivers and 57 million Uber customers.  Continue Reading Uber Data Breach Class Action Must Proceed to Arbitration

On September 5, 2018, the Law of 30 July 2018 on the Protection of Natural Persons with regard to the Processing of Personal Data (the “Law”) was published in the Belgian Official Gazette.

This is the second step in adapting the Belgian legal framework to the EU GDPR after the Law of 3 December 2017 Creating the Data Protection Authority, which reformed the Belgian Data Protection Authority.

The Law is available in French and Dutch.

On September 5, 2018, the European Commission (the “Commission”) announced in a press release the launch of the procedure to formally adopt the Commission’s adequacy decision with respect to Japan. Continue Reading EU Begins Formal Approval for Japan Adequacy Decision

On August 31, 2018, the California State Legislature passed SB-1121, a bill that delays enforcement of the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (“CCPA”) and makes other modest amendments to the law. The bill now goes to the Governor for signing. The provisions of the CCPA will become operative on January 1, 2020. As we have previously reported, the CCPA introduces key privacy requirements for businesses. The Act was passed quickly by California lawmakers in an effort to remove a ballot initiative of the same name from the November 6, 2018, statewide ballot. The CCPA’s hasty passage resulted in a number of drafting errors and inconsistencies in the law, which SB-1121 seeks to remedy. The amendments to the CCPA are primarily technical, with few substantive changes. Continue Reading CCPA Amended: Enforcement Delayed, Few Substantive Changes Made