Privacy & Information Security Law Blog

On November 8, 2017, Sears Holding Management Corporation (“Sears”) requested that the FTC reopen and modify a 2009 Commission Order (the “Order”) settling charges that Sears inadequately disclosed the scope of consumer data collected through the company’s software application. The initial FTC complaint alleged that Sears represented to consumers that its downloadable software application would track users’ “online browsing,” but in fact tracked nearly all of the users’ Internet behavior. Sears petitioned the FTC to modify the Order’s definition of ...

On November 8, 2017, the United States District Court for the Northern District of California ordered German defendants in an ongoing patent suit, BrightEdge Technologies, Inc. v. Searchmetrics GmbH, to produce a particular database, despite the defendants’ claims that such production would violate German privacy laws.

On November 7, 2017, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress of China published the second draft of the E-commerce Law (the “Second Draft”) and is allowing the general public an opportunity to comment through November 26, 2017.

On November 8, 2017, the FTC announced a settlement with Georgia-based online tax preparation service, TaxSlayer, LLC (“TaxSlayer”), regarding allegations that the company violated federal rules on financial privacy and data security. According to the FTC’s complaint, malicious hackers were able to gain full access to nearly 9,000 TaxSlayer user accounts between October 2015 and December 2015. The hackers allegedly used the personal information contained in the users’ accounts, including contact information, Social Security numbers and financial information, to engage in tax identify theft and obtain tax refunds through filing fraudulent tax returns. The FTC charged TaxSlayer with violating the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act’s Safeguards Rule and Privacy Rule. 

On October 31, 2017, the New York and Vermont Attorneys General (“Attorneys General”) announced a settlement with Hilton Domestic Operating Company, Inc., formerly known as Hilton Worldwide, Inc. (“Hilton”), to settle allegations that the company lacked reasonable data security and waited too long to report a pair of 2015 data breaches, which exposed over 350,000 credit card numbers. The Attorneys General alleged that Hilton failed to maintain reasonable data security and waited more than nine months after the first incident to notify consumers of the breaches, in violation of the states' consumer protection and breach notification laws.

Recently, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (“OPC”) issued its 2017 Global Privacy Enforcement Network Sweep results (the “Report”), which focused on certain privacy practices of online educational tools and services targeted at classrooms. The OPC examined the privacy practices of two dozen educational websites and apps used by K-12 students. The “sweep” sought to replicate the consumer experience by interacting with the websites and apps, and recording the privacy practices and controls in place. The overarching theme of the Report is “user controls over personal information,” which the OPC further refined into four subthemes: (1) transparency, (2) consent, (3) age-appropriate collection and disclosure, and (4) deletion of personal information.

On October 17, 2017, the French Data Protection Authority (“CNIL”), after a consultation with multiple industry participants that was launched on March 23, 2016, published its compliance pack on connected vehicles (the “Pack”) in line with its report of October 3, 2016. The Pack applies to connected vehicles for private use only (not to Intelligent Transport Systems), and describes the main principles data controllers must adhere to under both the current French legislation and the EU General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”).   

On October 24, 2017, an opinion issued by the EU’s Advocate General Bot (“Bot”) rejected Facebook’s assertion that its EU data processing activities fall solely under the jurisdiction of the Irish Data Protection Commissioner. The non-binding opinion was issued in relation to the CJEU case C-210/16, under which the German courts sought to clarify whether the data protection authority (“DPA”) in the German state of Schleswig-Holstein could take action against Facebook with respect to its use of web tracking technologies on a German education provider’s fan page without first providing notice.

The Centre for Information Policy Leadership at Hunton & Williams LLP (“CIPL”) recently submitted responses to the Irish Data Protection Commissioner (IDPC Response) and the CNIL (CNIL Response) on their public consultations, seeking views on transparency and international data transfers under the EU General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”).

The responses address a variety of questions posed by both data protection authorities (“DPAs”) and aim to provide insight on and highlight issues surrounding transparency and international transfers.

On October 17, 2017, the Article 29 Working Party (“Working Party”) issued Guidelines on Automated individual decision-making and Profiling for the purposes of Regulation 2016/679 (the “Guidelines”). The Guidelines aim to clarify the EU General Data Protection Regulation’s (“GDPR’s”) provisions that address the risks arising from profiling and automated decision-making.