Online Privacy

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On December 4, 2018, the New York Attorney General (“NY AG”) announced that Oath Inc., which was known as AOL Inc. (“AOL”) until June 2017 and is a subsidiary of Verizon Communications Inc., agreed to pay New York a $4.95 million civil penalty following allegations that it had violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (“COPPA”) by collecting and disclosing children’s personal information in conducting online auctions for advertising placement. This is the largest-ever COPPA penalty.

Continue Reading AOL Successor Agrees to Pay $4.95 Million in COPPA Enforcement Action

On September 28, 2018, California Governor Jerry Brown signed into law two identical bills regulating Internet-connected devices sold in California. S.B. 327 and A.B. 1906 (the “Bills”), aimed at the “Internet of Things,” require that manufacturers of connected devices—devices which are “capable of connecting to the Internet, directly or indirectly,” and are assigned an Internet Protocol or Bluetooth address, such as Nest’s thermostat—outfit the products with “reasonable” security features by January 1, 2020; or, in the bills’ words: “equip [a] device with a reasonable security feature or features that are appropriate to the nature and function of the device, appropriate to the information it may collect, contain, or transmit, and designed to protect the device and any information contained therein from unauthorized access, destruction, use, modification, or disclosure[.]” Continue Reading California Enacts New Requirements for Internet of Things Manufacturers

On September 26, 2018, the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation convened a hearing on Examining Consumer Privacy Protections with representatives of major technology and communications firms to discuss approaches to protecting consumer privacy, how the U.S. might craft a federal privacy law, and companies’ experiences in implementing the EU General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”). Continue Reading Senate Commerce Committee Holds Hearing on Examining Consumer Privacy Protections

On September 23, 2018, California Governor Jerry Brown signed into law SB-1121 (the “Bill”), which makes limited substantive and technical amendments to the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (“CCPA”). The Bill takes effect immediately,  and delays the California Attorney General’s enforcement of the CCPA until six months after publication of the Attorney General’s implementing regulations, or July 1, 2020, whichever comes first.  Continue Reading CCPA Amendment Bill Signed Into Law

The Information Commissioner’s Office (“ICO”) in the UK has issued the first formal enforcement action under the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the UK Data Protection Act 2018 (the “DPA”) on Canadian data analytics firm AggregateIQ Data Services Ltd. (“AIQ”). The enforcement action, in the form of an Enforcement Notice served under section 149 of the DPA, requires AIQ to “cease processing any personal data of UK or EU citizens obtained from UK political organizations or otherwise for the purposes of data analytics, political campaigning or any other advertising purposes.” Continue Reading ICO Issues First Enforcement Action Under the GDPR

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

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

On August 29, 2018, Bloomberg Law reported that four Senate Commerce Committee members are discussing a potential online privacy bill. The bipartisan group consists of Senators Jerry Moran (R-KS), Roger Wicker (R-MS), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and Brian Schatz (D-HI), according to anonymous Senate aides. Continue Reading Senate Commerce Committee Members Rumored to be Discussing Online Privacy Bill

As reported in BNA Privacy Law Watch, a California legislative proposal would allocate additional resources to the California Attorney General’s office to facilitate the development of regulations required under the recently enacted California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (“CCPA”). CCPA was enacted in June 2018 and takes effect January 1, 2020. CCPA requires the California Attorney General to issue certain regulations prior to the effective date, including, among others, (1) to update the categories of data that constitute “personal information” under CCPA, and (2) certain additional regulations governing compliance (such as how a business may verify a consumer’s request made pursuant to CCPA). The proposal, which was presented in two budget bills, would allocate $700,000 and five staff positions to the California Attorney General’s office to aid in the development of the required regulations. The legislature is expected to pass the relevant funding measure by August 31, 2018. California Attorney General Xavier Becerra has stated that he expects his office will issue its final rules under CCPA in June 2019.

On July 19, 2018, the French Data Protection Authority (“CNIL”) announced that it served a formal notice to two advertising startups headquartered in France, FIDZUP and TEEMO. Both companies collect personal data from mobile phones via software development kit (“SDK”) tools integrated into the code of their partners’ mobile apps—even when the apps are not in use—and process the data to conduct marketing campaigns on mobile phones. Continue Reading CNIL Serves Formal Notice to Marketing Companies to Obtain User’s Consent for Processing Geolocation Data for Ad Targeting