Where Does Privacy Go From Here: California, EU and Indian Data Privacy Laws and Global Compliance Programs
This article first appeared on Thomson Reuters Regulatory Intelligence.
The summer of 2018 may be regarded as a pivotal time in the history of data privacy laws. The European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) came into effect in May 2018, the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) was signed into law in June 2018 (and comes into effect on January 1, 2020), and a draft of India’s Personal Data Protection Bill (India DP Bill) was released in July 2018 (and is now under review by India’s government).
These developments, and more generally, the recent proliferation of data privacy laws around the world (notably, in Australia, China, Brazil, Hong Kong, and Singapore) represent a compliance challenge for many multinational organizations.
Regulatory Update: NAIC Summer 2019 National Meeting
The National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) held its Summer 2019 National Meeting (Summer Meeting) in New York City from August 3 to 6, 2019. The Summer Meeting was highlighted by the following activities.
New York Enacts Stricter Data Cybersecurity Laws
The flurry of state legislative activity in the wake of the enactment of the California Consumer Protection Act (CCPA) continues with the New York legislature recently passing two bills to increase accountability for the processing of personal information. On July 25, 2019, Governor Cuomo signed the two bills into law, one which amended the state’s data breach notification law, and another that created additional obligations for data breaches at credit reporting agencies. Together, the new laws require the implementation of reasonable data security safeguards, expand breach reporting obligations for certain types of information, and require that a “consumer credit reporting agency” that suffers a data breach provide five years of identity theft prevention services for impacted residents. Meanwhile, the more comprehensive New York Privacy Act, which many viewed as even more expansive than the CCPA, failed to gather the necessary support in the most recent legislative session.
Crunch Time in California – CCPA Amendments Hotly Debated and (Some) Defeated – Employee Data Is Back, Reasonable Definition of Personal Information Is Gone (For Now), and More!
With less than three months to go before amendments to California’s far reaching data privacy law need to be signed into law, the CCPA landscape may be changing yet again, as several amendments debated in the state Senate Judiciary Committee on July 9th underwent significant modifications. Eight proposed CCPA amendments were on the committee’s agenda, and several were hotly debated in an hours-long session that extended late into the night. In the end, two of the bills had substantive modifications, another was stalled, one was defeated, and the rest made it out of the committee, with limited changes. Here we summarize the highlights.
Chinese Government’s Latest Effort in Tightening Cross-Border Transfer of Personal Information
The Chinese government is proposing heightened requirements on cross-border transfers of personal information from China, recently publishing draft Measures on Security Assessment of Cross-border Transfer of Personal Information (the “Draft Measures”). This comes less than a month after the Chinese government issued another draft Measures for Data Security Management which require network operators to conduct a security assessment for any transfer of important data (i.e. any data that may directly affect China’s national security, economic security, social stability, or public health and security if leaked) to overseas. The Draft Measures now focus on the cross-border transfer of personal information by network operators and are viewed as a continuous effect of the Chinese government to strengthen the data protection in China.
Maine’s Act to Protect the Privacy of Online Consumer Information
Since the passage of the California Consumer Privacy Act (Cal. Civ. Code §1798.100 et seq.) (“CCPA”), several states are following in California’s footsteps and adopting privacy bills that would allow consumers to object to the sale of their personal information.
Stay Up-To-Date on the CCPA Through Sidley’s CCPA Monitor
Sidley has consolidated its materials and resources on the CCPA, including an amendment tracker, on the new Sidley CCPA Monitor.
Explore the law and Sidley insights, available now.
The CCPA Ripple Effect: Nevada Passes Privacy Legislation
With about half a year to go until the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA)’s effective date, and with significant amendments still percolating to define the scope and impact of the CCPA come 2020, other states continue to consider whether to adopt new and broader privacy laws of their own, with Nevada recently taking the distinction of being the first to follow the CCPA trend. While the scope and obligations of the Nevada law is significantly narrower than the CCPA and thus largely will align with current CCPA implementation projects, the new Nevada law does expand upon the CCPA in one particularly notable way—it moves the deadline to facilitate opt-outs of sales of personal information up to October 2019. (more…)
NYC Automated Decision-Making Task Force Forum Provides Insight Into Broader Efforts to Regulate Artificial Intelligence
More and more entities are deploying machine learning and artificial intelligence to automate tasks previously performed by humans. Such efforts carry with them real benefits, such as the enhancement of operational efficiency and the reduction of costs, but they also raise a number of concerns regarding their potential impacts on human society, particularly as computer algorithms are increasingly used to determine important outcomes like individuals’ treatment within the criminal justice system.
This mixture of benefits and concerns is starting to attract the interest of regulators. Efforts in the European Union, Canada, and the United States have initiated an ongoing discussion around how to regulate “automated decision-making” and what principles should guide it. And while not all of these regulatory efforts will directly implicate private companies, they may nonetheless provide insight for companies seeking to build consumer trust in their artificial intelligence systems or better prepare themselves for the overall direction that regulation is taking.
Fifth Annual Sidley Privacy and Cybersecurity Roundtable
We held our 5th Annual Privacy and Cybersecurity Roundtable on May 1, in Washington, D.C. The event featured the Chair of the European Data Protection Board Andrea Jelinek and FTC Commissioner Noah Phillips. Other government speakers represented the White House, UK’s Information Commissioner’s Office, and staff members from the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives. Other distinguished panelists included Cam Kerry of Brookings and Jane Horvath from Apple. The speakers addressed privacy and cybersecurity enforcement in the U.S. and EU, Brexit, Online Harms and the prospects for federal privacy legislation. The insightful program was followed by a competition between the sausage-making (and brewing) achievements of leading privacy jurisdictions such as Brussels, California, Washington, D.C. and China (representing a privacy continuum!). Sidley also commemorated “20 Years of CyberLaw at Sidley” – two decades since the founding of today’s Privacy and Cybersecurity practice. We look forward to continuing to thrive and serve our clients. We hope to see you at next year’s Privacy and Cybersecurity Roundtable.