Privacy & Information Security Law Blog

On February 11, 2016, the Article 29 Working Party (the “Working Party”) issued a statement on the 2016 action plan for the implementation of the EU General Data Protection Regulation (the “Regulation”). The action plan outlines the priorities for the Working Party in light of the transition to a new legal framework in Europe and the introduction of the European Data Protection Board (the “EDPB”). Accompanying the statement is a document, Work Program 2016-2018, detailing the tasks of the Working Party’s subgroups during the transitional period between the adoption of the Regulation and its implementation.

On February 10, 2016, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Judicial Redress Act, which had been approved by the Senate the night before and included a recent Senate amendment. The House of Representatives previously passed the original bill in October 2015, but the bill was sent back to the House due to the recent Senate amendment. The Judicial Redress Act grants non-U.S. citizens certain rights, including a private right of action for alleged privacy violations that occur in the U.S. The amendment limits the right to sue to only those citizens of countries that (1) permit the “transfer of personal data for commercial purposes” to the U.S., and (2) do not impose personal data transfer policies that “materially impede” U.S. national security interests. The bill now heads to President Obama to sign.

On February 9, 2016, President Obama signed an Executive Order establishing a permanent Federal Privacy Council (“Privacy Council”) that will serve as the principal interagency support structure to improve the privacy practices of government agencies and entities working on their behalf. The Privacy Council is charged with building on existing interagency efforts to protect privacy and provide expertise and assistance to government agencies, expand the skill and career development opportunities of agency privacy professionals, improve the management of agency privacy programs, and promote collaboration between and among agency privacy professionals.

On February 3, 2016, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) announced that an Administrative Law Judge (“ALJ”) ruled that Lincare, Inc. (“Lincare”) violated the HIPAA Privacy Rule and ordered the company to pay $239,800 to OCR.

On February 3, 2016, the Article 29 Working Party (the “Working Party”) issued a statement on the consequences of the ruling of the Court of Justice of the European Union (the “CJEU”) in the Schrems case invalidating the European Commission’s Safe Harbor Decision.

A federal judge of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois denied Neiman Marcus’ motion to dismiss in Remijas et al. v. Neiman Marcus Group, LLC, 1:14-cv-01735.  As we previously reported, the Seventh Circuit reversed Judge James B. Zagel’s earlier decision dismissing the class action complaint based on Article III standing. At that time the Seventh Circuit declined to analyze dismissal under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) due to, among other reasons, the district court’s focus on standing.

On February 2, 2016, a new EU-U.S. transatlantic data transfer agreement was reached. Věra Jourová, European Commissioner for Justice, Consumers and Gender Equality, presented the new agreement to the European Commission (the “Commission”) today. According to the Commission’s press release, the new agreement will be called the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield.

On February 1, 2016, Věra Jourová, European Commissioner for Justice, Consumers and Gender Equality, told the European Parliament that an agreement on a new U.S.-EU Safe Harbor agreement has not yet been reached. Jourová indicated that an agreement is close, but additional work is needed to finalize it.

On January 28, 2016, the Centre for Information Policy Leadership (“CIPL”) held a special roundtable at Hunton & Williams’ Brussels office to examine the “essential equivalence” requirement for protection of data transfers to non-EU countries set by the Court of Justice of the European Union’s (“CJEU's”) Schrems decision. The roundtable brought together leading lawyers, corporate privacy officers, legal experts, regulators and policymakers to discuss the critical issues and impact of the new “essential equivalence” requirement for global data transfers set by the CJEU, and its relevance to the current EU-U.S. negotiations of a new Safe Harbor agreement.

According to Bloomberg BNA, Paul F. Nemitz, Director for Fundamental Rights and Union Citizenship at the Directorate-General Justice of the European Commission, said at a privacy conference that he hoped a new U.S.-EU Safe Harbor agreement would be reached by the evening of Monday, February 1, 2016.