Data Points: Privacy & Data Security Blog

On August 17, 2017, Delaware amended its personal information protection law, Delaware Code Title 6, Chapter 12B.  The amendment becomes effective 240 days after enactment or March 14, 2018. The amended law significantly enhances the protections afforded Delaware residents whose personal information has been – or is reasonably believed to have been – breached, by adding obligations on the part of a person or entity who conducts business in Delaware or owns, licenses and maintains “personal information” as the Delaware law defines the term. The major changes to the law are ...

By Nathan A. White

Can the government force the hosting service of an activist website company to turn over vast amounts of user data in order to track down political protesters?  According to a federal court ruling, the answer  -- Yes, but let’s slow this train down a little bit.  On Thursday, August 24, 2017, District of Columbia Superior Court Chief Judge Robert E. Morin ordered DreamHost to comply with a search warrant issued by the Department of Justice on July 12, 2017 seeking IP addresses and other data of visitors to “disruptj20.org” website hosted by DreamHost.  Disruptj20 ...

By Bill Butler

Recently, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in Attias v. CareFirst, Inc., No. 16-7108, that customers had standing to sue a health insurer for a 2014 data breach in which the customers’ information was stolen.  In reversing the district court’s dismissal of the class action, the D.C. Circuit held that the customers’ allegations that the hackers accessed and took their Social Security numbers, credit card numbers, and health insurance subscriber ID numbers were each independently sufficient to show actual or imminent injury.  The customers’ complaint ...

PRIVACY AND DATA SECURITY IN THE TRUMP ERA: HOW TO TALK TO THE FBI AND YOUR IT DEPARTMENT IN A DATA BREACH (MAY 24, 2017): Effectively responding to a data breach requires clear communication with a web of internal and external groups. Two important groups are law enforcement and a company’s internal IT department. With the help of an FBI agent and an IT professional, this seminar will explore how to effectively work with these two groups to address a breach. Wednesday, May 24, 2017 11:30 AM - 1:00 PM. Register here.

Recently the state of New Mexico enacted the Data Breach Notification Act, making it the 48th state in the United States to enact a statute requiring notice to individuals impacted by a data breach. In doing so, New Mexico follows some trends we've been predicting at the state level.  These trends include covering encrypted data in the definition of personal information if the encryption key is accessed as well, and – importantly – requiring that companies engage in reasonable security measures to protect personal information in their possession. New Mexico also joins a handful of ...

By Bill Butler

In August 2016, the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) addressed the effect of the Cybersecurity Framework (“NIST Framework”) issued by the National Institute of Standards and Technology on FTC enforcement actions under Section 5 of the FTC Act.  While there have been few enforcement actions to gauge the actual impact of the NIST Framework, the FTC’s recent public comment on the National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s (“NTIA”) proposed “coordinated vulnerability disclosure” template (“Template”) further ...

We don’t see a lot of data breach litigation here in the Fourth Circuit, so it is notable that the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals issued an opinion recently that weighs in on the standing debate (For more on the debate: Constitutional Standing Provides Fertile Battleground In Data Breach Litigation). In Beck v. McDonald, the plaintiffs in two consolidated cases sought to establish Article III standing based on the harm from embarrassment, mental distress, inconvenience, the increased risk of future identity theft and the cost of measures to protect against it after (i) a ...

By Tandy Mathis, Elena Mitchell, and Mindy Vervais

Did you know that if you’ve taken a New York City taxi since 2009, your pick-up and drop-off locations were recorded and published (through June of 2016) on the internet for anyone to find? Now, New York City officials want ride-sharing companies like Uber and Lyft to start providing drop-off and pick-up location data, too.

The New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission, or TLC, currently collects all kinds of trip data from New York City taxis—including pick-up and drop-off dates and times, coordinates of the start and end ...

Saturday January 28, 2017 is Data Privacy Day.  The Moore & Van Allen Privacy and Data Security group took a break from the pre-holiday revelries to put together some thoughts and tips for DataPoints.  So hoist a glass and enjoy this read, and try not to ponder too long the irony that Data Privacy Day falls on the same day as China’s New Year’s celebration.  Cheers!

• Update vendor contracts. Make sure that contracts include required data security and privacy requirements. Some older laws and regulations already impose specific data security and privacy standards for certain industries ...

By Leslie Pedernales

A professional football team clinches their playoff spot in an upset game, then hits the locker room for a celebration and an inspirational pep talk from their winning coach.  The perfect application for livestreaming, one might think.  Opening a window into this mysterious world for all the rest of us to see and experience.  Not so fast.

After the Pittsburgh Steelers upset the Kansas City Chiefs in the AFC playoff game on January 15, Steelers wide receiver Antonio Brown invited the world into the Steelers’ locker room to join in the celebration through Facebook ...