In 2019, businesses learned that they could no longer hide from the inherent tension between commercial use of individual data and individual privacy interests. Over the past month or so, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) took a number of notable privacy-related actions against a host of companies regarding what it considered to be their problematic online activities, which provide learning lessons to any business with an online presence. Many states have passed or carried over a patchwork of privacy legislation for consideration in their next legislative session, including 25 pieces of privacy legislation that are pending in New York state alone. In-house counsel, and we attorneys in private practice, must help our clients keep all of these balls in the air as deadlines pass and others rapidly approach.

Safeguarding Consumer Data

In mid-November, a Utah-based technology company agreed to implement a comprehensive data security program to settle FTC allegations that it failed to put in place reasonable security safeguards that allowed a hacker to access the personal information of one million consumers.