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On March 29, 2023, the California Office of Administrative Law (the “OAL”) approved the first substantive set of California Privacy Rights Act (“CPRA”) regulations from the California Privacy Protection Agency (the “CPPA”), which we addressed in a previous blog. Those regulations went into effect immediately. As discussed in a recent episode of Ropes & Gray’s privacy podcast, The Data Day, the CPPA has also begun consideration of an additional set of regulations that would implement other CPRA requirements, issuing an Invitation for Preliminary Comments on Proposed Rulemaking Cybersecurity Audits, Risk Assessments, and Automated Decisionmaking. Enforcement of the CPRA, including its implementing regulations, is scheduled to begin on July 1, 2023. However, on March 30, 2023—just one day after the OAL approved the CPPA’s regulations—the California Chamber of Commerce announced that it had filed suit in Sacramento Superior Court seeking to delay enforcement until 12 months after a final and complete set of regulations has been adopted.…

Continue Reading California Finalizes Privacy Regulations: Enforcement Scheduled to Begin in July 2023

Just in time for Data Privacy Day, the California attorney general (“California AG”) announced a new round of privacy investigations targeting the retail, travel, and food service industries.  The investigative sweep will focus on “popular apps” that allegedly fail to honor consumer requests to opt out of the “sale” of their personal information.  The sweep will also review responses to requests sent on behalf of consumers by authorized agents such as the “Permission Slip” application developed by Consumer Reports.  Even with the considerable attention owed to the new requirements of the California Privacy Rights Act (“CPRA”)—which amends and expands on the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”)—along with the significant recent activity by the California Privacy Protection Agency, businesses should not overlook their ongoing obligations to comply with the CCPA prior to the CPRA’s enforcement beginning on July 1, 2023.…

Continue Reading California AG Announces New CCPA Sweep

On Friday, February 3, 2023, the California Privacy Protection Agency (the “CPPA”) Board (the “Board”) approved draft regulations issued under the California Consumer Privacy Act, as amended and expanded by the California Privacy Rights Act (together, the “CCPA”). The draft regulations will now go through review by the Office of Administrative Law (the “OAL”), the final step in the rulemaking process before the regulations are scheduled to take effect. The draft agreed upon by the Board is in substantially the same form as the draft regulations published in November 2022 with only minor grammatical and stylistic changes. As such, the draft regulations will have a significant impact on many businesses if approved, adding specifics around the CCPA’s proportionality requirements, contracts with service providers and other third parties, opt-out preference signals, and processes for responding to data subject rights requests. In the same meeting, the Board also requested public comment on topics that are likely to be covered in a new set of regulations from February 10, 2023, through March 27, 2023.…

Continue Reading Across the Finish Line (Almost): Revised California Consumer Privacy Act Regulations Approved by California Privacy Board

In the new year, comprehensive privacy laws go into operation in five states:  California (January 1), Virginia (January 1), Colorado (July 1), Connecticut (July 1), and Utah (December 31).  Subsequent blog posts will cover each of these laws in detail.  In this post, we begin a series analyzing the impact of the California Privacy Rights Act (“CPRA”) in greater depth. 

The CPRA will go into operation on January 1, 2023 and will be enforceable by the newly created California Privacy Protection Agency (“CPPA”) beginning on July 1, 2023. Passed by ballot initiative in November 2020, the CPRA amends and expands the California Consumer Privacy Act (together with the CPRA, the “CCPA/CPRA”), already the most far-reaching privacy legislation currently in operation in the United States.  As amended, the CCPA/CPRA expands consumer privacy rights and data processing obligations, creating new rights to limit the use of sensitive personal information and to correct personal information stored by a business.  It implements certain “principles of processing” like the purpose limitation, requiring businesses to evaluate their uses of personal information to ensure they are proportionate to the requirements of disclosed business and commercial purposes.  It also enhances opt-out rights in the context of cross-context behavioral advertising and requires that businesses enter into new contractual terms with service providers to which they disclose the personal information of California residents.…

Continue Reading Companies Wrestle with Compliance in the Lead Up to Effectiveness of the CPRA and Other State Privacy Laws

California

At a meeting of the California Privacy Protection Agency (“CPPA”) on June 8, we learned additional information about the initial batch of proposed regulations (“Proposed Regulations”) to the California Privacy Rights Act (“CPRA”) that were published on May 27. The Proposed Regulations keep much of the pre-existing California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”) regulations but modify and add some key provisions. Because the CPRA was drafted as an amendment to the CCPA, the Proposed Regulations reference the CCPA (as amended by the CPRA). The Proposed Regulations focus on data subject rights, contractual requirements, and obligations related to disclosures, notices, and consents. Additional proposals will cover cybersecurity audits, privacy risk assessments, and automated decision making, among other areas. While we expect significant changes as the Proposed Regulations proceed through the formal rulemaking process, which the CPPA has not yet officially started, we provide our key takeaways below:…

Continue Reading Recent Activity from the California Privacy Protection Agency

The California Attorney General’s office (OAG) recently released its first formal written opinion on the scope of the rights granted to consumers under the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), specifically, the right for a consumer to know about the personal information that a business collects from them. The opinion comes in response to a question submitted by California Assembly member Kevin Kiley as to whether a consumer’s right to know the specific pieces of personal information that a business has collected about that consumer applies to internally generated inferences the business holds about them. The OAG asserted that the right to know does apply to such inferences, albeit with certain key exceptions.
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Continue Reading California Attorney General’s Office Releases First Formal CCPA Opinion

As 2021 comes to a close, it is a great time to take stock of the present state of affairs with respect to U.S. privacy laws. With the relatively recent passage of comprehensive privacy laws in California, and additional countries adopting laws that closely follow the principles of the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), along with increasing public concerns regarding how companies manage customers’ personal data, legal practitioners entered 2021 with high hopes that comprehensive federal privacy legislation may finally be on the horizon. Nevertheless, in a trend that is likely to continue in the year ahead, it was the states rather than federal legislatures that successfully added to the ranks of privacy laws with which businesses will soon need to comply.
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Continue Reading Momentum Builds for State Privacy Laws but the Possibility of a Federal Law Remains Remote

BillBuilding on the momentum of the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”),  California Privacy Rights Act (“CPRA”), and the Virginia Consumer Data Protection Act (“CDPA”), and the consideration of similar laws in states like Washington and New York, Minnesota’s legislature is debating HF 36, introduced on January 7, 2021, and HF 1492, introduced on February 22, 2021. Significantly, HF 36 grants consumers a private right of action for any violation of its provisions—something that was considered but not ultimately included in the CCPA, which provides for a private right of action only in the event of a data breach.  In contrast, HF 1492 joins Virginia’s CDPA by relying on regulatory enforcement and generally pursuing  an approach that is closer to Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”). If passed, HF 36 would take effect on June 30, 2022, and HF 1492, also known as the Minnesota Consumer Data Privacy Act (“MCDPA”) on July 31, 2022.
Continue Reading Minnesota Debates New Privacy Bills

BillFlorida joined the fray of state legislatures vying to become the third state to enact comprehensive data privacy legislation following the passage of Virginia’s Consumer Data Protection Act (“CDPA”). Introduced in February with the support of Governor DeSantis, House Bill 969 (“HB 969”) shared many similarities with the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”), including a private right of action. At the same time, the previously identical Senate Bill 1734 (“SB 1734”) was recently amended to limit the scope of the law and remove the private right of action.  As with some many other state laws, the Florida bills have died for the present legislative session due to the breakdown over the private cause of action.  …
Continue Reading Florida House and Senate Privacy Legislation Fails to Pass