This month, the Federal Bureau of Investigation published information and guidance for organizations about ransomware attacks, along with some suggested preventative measures.  There is a section in the bulletin discussing whether victims should consider paying ransom to attackers.  According to the statement, the FBI “does not advocate paying a ransom, in part because it does not guarantee and organization will regain access to its data,” and paying ransoms emboldens criminals to target others. Several of…

In our May blog post, we took issue with the broadcast statement that ‘consumer privacy law was sweeping the country and that other states were jumping on the California Consumer Privacy Law (CCPA) bandwagon to enact their own state law.’ The problem as we saw it, was that the truth behind these sensationalistic statements was a bit more nuanced than people were led to believe. Most states, we found, that introduced consumer privacy legislation simply…

Those interested in keeping up with the latest news impacting the California Consumer Privacy Act have been heavily focused on AB 25, and its potential to exclude employees from the scope of the CCPA. In a marathon late-night session, the California Senate Judiciary Committee weighed in July 11 on various bills—including AB 25. An while AB 25 was part of the Committee debate, that amendment may actually make the bill less useful than first intended.…

In just a few short months, on January 1, 2020, the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) is set to go into effect, establishing new consumer privacy rights for California residents and imposing significant new duties and obligations on commercial businesses conducting business in the state of California. Consumer rights include the right to know what personal information a business is collecting, selling, and disclosing about them; the right to deletion; the right to opt-out of…

The eDiscovery and Information Governance Group has been ranked in Tier Three in the latest Legal 500 ranking. Richard (Rick) Lutkus was also recognized as a Rising Star in Media, Technology & Telecoms – Cyber Law. Rick Lutkus and Kathleen McConnell were also recognized by the editorial as recommended lawyers. Led by Scott Carlson (also ranked in the Legal 500) and Jay Carle, the group has been lauded by clients and peers for…

Senate Bill 561, which would have generated even greater compliance challenges and litigation risk for businesses, has been held in committee and placed on suspense. This development effectively prevents the bill from advancing for a vote and is a bit of CCPA good news for businesses. It also serves as a minor setback to consumer privacy interest groups and plaintiff-oriented trial lawyers, who were banking on even more lucrative individual consumer violation claims after January…

Cross-Posted from The Global Privacy Watch Blog In Part 1 of our ‘Texas Joins the Privacy Fray’ series, we focused on the Texas Consumer Privacy Act. Here, we shine the light on the Texas Privacy Protection Act (HB 4390). The TXPPA is distinguishable from both the TXCPA and the CCPA because the applicability threasholds are different. For the TXPPA to apply, a business must 1) be doing business in Texas; 2) have more than…