In this remote era, companies are increasingly being approached by their business teams with ideas about products and services that involve video or audio recordings of their consumers. It may also involve letting people manipulate photos of themselves. Sometimes, those recordings and pictures are of children. Content that contain images or audio of individuals are considered personal information under many laws, including the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). What does this mean for companies?…

In the current pandemic era, kids are spending more time online, be it for school or entertainment. Companies are therefore gearing up for increased interaction with children online or through connected devices. As children around the globe return to school, whatever  that return looks like, the FTC and the International Consumer Protection Enforcement Network (ICPEN) remind us that certain rules apply when dealing with kids online.…

The National Institute of Standards and Technology has issued a set of draft principles for “explainable” artificial intelligence and is accepting comments until October 15, 2020. The authors of the draft principles outline four ways that those who develop AI systems can ensure that consumers understand the decisions reached by AI systems. The four principles are:…

The California AG has now released the final CCPA regulations, as approved by the Office of Administrative Law (OAL).  The final draft (issued August 14, 2020) incorporates some relatively minor changes that the OAG submitted as part of its final rulemaking package, as summarized in its addendum to the final statement of reasons. In addition to generally “non-substantive” edits for consistency, etc. the OAG withdrew four sections (999.305(a)(5), 999.306(b)(2), 999.315(c), and 999.326(c)) from…

With the current limited exemptions under CCPA for employment and business-to-business related information set to expire January 1, 2021, there is uncertainty over when businesses should prepare to extend CCPA compliance efforts to this type of information. However, a pending amendment in the California senate, and/or the impending CPRA ballot initiative in November may bring clarity to the issue.…

NIST’s new draft guidance, Special Publication 800-53B, Control Baselines for Information Systems and Organizations, provides important information on selecting both security and privacy control baselines for the Federal Government. These control baselines are from NIST Special Publication 800-53 and have been moved to this separate publication “so the SP 800-53 [can] serve as a consolidated catalog of security and privacy controls regardless of how those controls [are] used by different communities of interest.”   The…

The Supreme Court’s recent decision in Barr v. American Association of Political Consultants held the government-debt exception of the TCPA unconstitutional under the First Amendment’s Free Speech Clause.  This means that going forward, companies that make “debt-collection” calls on behalf of the federal government can only do so with the prior express written consent of the called individuals.…