data security

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In an active week for federal regulators, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) joined the CFPB in announcing important initiatives that may change privacy and data security practices in major ways.

On August 11, the FTC released its Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, seeking public input on a host of questions relating to what it describes as “commercial surveillance”—or “the business of collecting, analyzing, and profiting from information about people”—in order to determine whether to issue a  new rule “to protect people’s privacy and information in the commercial surveillance economy.”    … Continue Reading

Phil Yannella, Ballard Spahr litigation partner and Practice Leader of Ballard’s Privacy & Data Security Group, recently authored a treatise on data breach and privacy litigation.  The book, Cyber Litigation: Data Brach, Data Privacy & Digital Rights, is published by Thomson Reuters and is available now for purchase.  The publication of CyberLitigation comes at an important moment as the U.S.… Continue Reading

Subscribers to each service will receive weekly emails and have the opportunity to discuss developments in each area during a monthly call.  Additionally, subscribers will be enrolled in an interactive, searchable, online database that enables subscribers to have 24-hour access to our information and analysis.

To further educate our current subscribers and anyone else interested in subscribing to the trackers about how to maximize the online database, we will be offering preview sessions to provide training on the various tools available through the dashboard, such as the interactive map and the search functions that will allow information to be sorted by topic, jurisdiction, date, and for the FCRA tracker, by federal court and counsel for plaintiffs.… Continue Reading

On December 15th, the FTC announced in a press release that it had reached a settlement with a mortgage industry data analytics company to resolve allegations in the FTC’s administrative complaint that the company had failed to ensure one of its vendors was adequately securing personal data about tens of thousands of mortgage holders under the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) Safeguards Rule. … Continue Reading

On December 18, 2020, the Office of the Comptroller of the Current (OCC), Federal Reserve Board (FRB), and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) announced an interagency notice of proposed rulemaking that would require supervised banking organizations to provide notification of significant computer security incidents to their primary federal regulator.  Under the proposed rule, for incidents that could result in a banking organization’s inability to deliver services to a material portion of its customer base, jeopardize the viability of key operations of a banking organization, or impact the stability of the financial sector, the banking organization must notify its primary federal regulator no later than 36 hours after determining an incident has occurred. … Continue Reading

On October 29, 2020, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) will host a virtual workshop entitled, “Green Lights & Red Flags: FTC Rules of the Road for Business.”  The workshop will cover a broad array of topics within the FTC’s jurisdiction, including truth-in-advertising law, social media marketing, data security, business-to-business fraud, and other business basics.… Continue Reading

On February 25th, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) released its annual Privacy and Data Security Update, which highlights the FTC’s activities during the past year.

According to the update, the FTC enforcement actions in the past year involved privacy and data security addressing a range of issues, including identity theft, credit reporting and financial privacy, the EU-U.S.… Continue Reading

Yesterday, Andrew Smith, Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, announced the following three major improvements that have been made to FTC orders in data security cases:

  1. Specificity: To counter past criticisms that FTC orders to implement comprehensive information security programs were too vague, FTC orders will now require specific security safeguards that address specific allegations in the complaint brought against each company.
… Continue Reading

I am pleased to announce that Kim Phan, an attorney noted for her work on privacy and data security issues for a variety of industries, including consumer financial services, retail, and higher education, has returned to Ballard Spahr as a partner after a short absence.  She will be based in the firm’s Washington, D.C.… Continue Reading

Arizona Governor Doug Ducey signed HB 2154 into law on April 11, 2018, amending and strengthening the state’s data breach notification law. Notably, the amended law significantly expands the definition of “personal information” to include a number of new data elements, including online account credentials, certain health information, and biometric data used to authenticate an individual when the individual accesses an online account. … Continue Reading