On December 1, 2015, House and Senate conferees reached a deal on a long-term highway bill, the “Fixing America’s Surface Transportation Act” (H.R. 22). While the bill’s more than 1,300 pages are largely focused on highway, transportation, and safety issues, the bill includes amendments to two federal financial privacy laws, the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (“GLBA”) and the Fair Credit Reporting Act (“FCRA”). In particular, the GLBA amendment would provide an exception to the annual privacy notice requirement for a financial institution that meets certain conditions. This amendment could provide those financial institutions that do not share customer information with nonaffiliated third parties outside of GLBA exceptions (i.e., those that do not provide an opt out for sharing with nonaffiliated third parties) with significant regulatory relief. The House and Senate are each expected to vote on and approve the compromise bill this week before the current surface transportation reauthorization expires on Friday.
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