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Cybersecurity & Privacy
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June 02, 2023
Facebook Slips DC's Privacy Suit Over Apps' Data Harvesting
A D.C. Superior Court judge has freed Facebook from a lawsuit brought by the district's attorney general in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica data harvesting scandal, finding that the social media giant hadn't misled users about its third-party app monitoring practices or its "swift" response to the sprawling data misuse incident.
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June 02, 2023
Ill. Judge Mulls Redo Of First BIPA Trial, Prejudgment Interest
An Illinois federal judge warned BNSF Railway on Friday that if he favors its bid for a new damages trial and throws out the $228 million verdict in the first case under Illinois' biometric privacy law to go before a jury last year, evidence it persuaded him to exclude from the first go-round on the company's finances could come into play.
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June 02, 2023
9th Circ. Revives Lanham Act Suit As Dissent Raises Red Flag
A split Ninth Circuit panel on Friday revived Enigma Software's unfair competition lawsuit against Malwarebytes Inc. over the cybersecurity company labeling Enigma's software as a threat, with the dissenting judge saying the decision sends "a chilling message" that cybersecurity companies could be held liable by classifying a program as malware.
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June 02, 2023
Claims Court Says Four Cos. Treated Unfairly On $1.5B IT Deal
The Court of Federal Claims has backed protests from four companies over a $1.5 billion U.S. Department of Commerce information technology contract, saying the agency unreasonably assessed aspects of their proposals, but rejected several similar protests.
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June 02, 2023
Judge OKs $976K In Legal Fees In Citrix Autodialer Suit
A federal judge in Maryland has given final approval to a $2.75 million settlement between Citrix Systems Inc. and a group of people claiming the company engaged in illegal telemarketing calls to sell their products.
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June 02, 2023
Top Groups Lobbying The FCC
In the month of May, the Federal Communications Commission heard from interest groups lobbying the agency on issues ranging from the rollout of next-generation 911 to rural broadband funding, freeing up the airwaves, regulatory fees and more.
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June 02, 2023
Judge Trims Health Co.'s Ransomware Suit Against Blackbaud
A federal judge in Indiana has pared down a lawsuit brought by Trinity Health and its insurer against software company Blackbaud over a 2020 ransomware attack, suggesting that Blackbaud did not have a common law duty under Indiana state law to safeguard the exposed data.
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June 02, 2023
JPML Groups Bass Pro Website Spying Suits In Pennsylvania
Bass Pro Shops and its subsidiary retail chain Cabela's will face all the proposed class actions accusing them of wiretapping consumers by using "session replay" software on their websites in Pennsylvania federal court, according to a Friday order consolidating the suits.
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June 02, 2023
JPML Consolidates T-Mobile Data Breach Suits In Missouri
The Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation on Friday consolidated in the Western District of Missouri a slew of proposed class actions against T-Mobile over a data breach that occurred in 2022, finding that consolidation will best serve the parties and that the Missouri court was supported by T-Mobile and some plaintiffs.
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June 02, 2023
6th Circ. Revives TCPA Suit Against Direct Energy
The Sixth Circuit has revived a Telephone Consumer Protection Act suit alleging Direct Energy LP sent a consumer ringless voicemails, overturning a district court ruling that axed the suit on the grounds that the consumer suffered no concrete harm from receiving one.
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June 02, 2023
Air Force Officer Gets 3 Years For Keeping Classified Info
A former Air Force lieutenant colonel who pled guilty to mishandling more than 300 classified files or documents was sentenced in Florida federal court Thursday to three years in prison, while also being given three years of supervised release and ordered to pay a $25,000 fine.
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June 02, 2023
Chicago Tortilla Maker Sued Over Pay And Privacy Violations
A deliveryman has hit a longtime Chicago-based tortilla manufacturer with a proposed class and collective action, claiming it fails to pay drivers the correct minimum and overtime wages, and has also illegally collected and stored its employees' biometric data without their consent.
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June 02, 2023
Procter & Gamble Hit With TCPA Suit Over Toothbrush Texts
The Procter & Gamble Co. disregarded the National Do Not Call Registry and ignored individual consumers' requests that it stop texting them about its toothbrush maker subsidiary Oral-B, according to a new proposed class action in Ohio federal court.
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June 02, 2023
Sweden Can't Slow Huawei Arbitration For Jurisdictional Fight
Arbitrators have denied Sweden's bid to bifurcate a regulatory dispute with the Chinese telecom manufacturer Huawei, setting up a possible showdown late next year over Swedish rules excluding the company from its nascent 5G networks.
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June 02, 2023
SEC Database Breach Was Broader Than Initially Revealed
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission revealed on Friday that its enforcement team's improper access to documents related to pending in-house proceedings was much more extensive than initially revealed, saying that the breach may have affected nearly 90 cases.
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June 01, 2023
Software And Mortgage Cos. Sued Over Data Breach
A class of consumers says a mortgage company and its call center vendor's failure to safeguard customers' sensitive personal information opened the companies to a March data breach that affected millions of people, according to a new lawsuit in Massachusetts federal court.
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June 01, 2023
LinkedIn May Owe $425M Over Data Practices, Microsoft Says
Microsoft said Thursday that it is setting aside $425 million after Irish regulators proposed fining the company over data practices its LinkedIn subsidiary uses to generate targeted advertisements.
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June 01, 2023
Porn Org. Seeks Pause Of Utah Online Age Verification Law
A trade organization for the porn industry has urged a Utah federal court to pause enforcement of the state's new law requiring visitors to adult-oriented websites to prove their age before accessing the content, arguing that the law will not survive the strict scrutiny the First Amendment demands.
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June 01, 2023
Sen. Asks DOJ To See If TikTok CEO Perjured Self In Congress
U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., announced Thursday that he wants U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland to investigate whether TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew committed perjury when he told Congress back in March that American users' data was not stored in China.
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June 01, 2023
Apple Denies Russian Claims It Helped US Hack Gov't IPhones
Apple on Thursday denied a report by Russia's Federal Security Service that alleged that the tech giant had worked with U.S. intelligence agencies to hack into thousands of iPhones to spy on Russian diplomats.
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June 01, 2023
Activision Gamers' Bid To Depose CEO Paused For FTC Trial
A California federal judge on Thursday postponed gamers' request to depose Activision Blizzard's CEO Bobby Kotick in their suit opposing Microsoft's planned $68.7 billion purchase of the video game company, saying it "doesn't make sense" to rule before an upcoming August trial in the FTC's suit challenging the deal.
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June 01, 2023
Smith Gambrell Data Breach Suit Withdrawn In Georgia
A woman has dropped her proposed class action against Smith Gambrell & Russell LLP over a 2021 data breach, according to a notice entered Wednesday.
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May 31, 2023
FTC Can't Unilaterally Redo $5B Privacy Deal, Meta Tells Court
Meta Platforms Inc. is pressing a D.C. federal court to block the Federal Trade Commission from revising a $5 billion privacy settlement to force the social media giant to undertake additional reforms, including halting its ability to profit from its youngest users' data, arguing that the agency lacks the authority to "remake" the court-approved deal.
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May 31, 2023
Does A Bear Film In The Woods? Couple's Suit Says Yes
A Connecticut couple say a camera-clad bear outfitted by the state is taping their property without a warrant, accusing Connecticut's department of energy and environmental protection of violating their Fourth Amendment rights in a new lawsuit in Connecticut federal court.
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May 31, 2023
Amazon To Pay $30M To End FTC's Alexa, Ring Privacy Claims
Amazon said Wednesday that it has agreed to pay more than $30 million in separate settlements reached with federal regulators who alleged that the tech giant breached the privacy of children who used its Alexa voice assistant service and users of its home security camera company, Ring LLC.
Expert Analysis
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How Fla. Amendment Changes The State's Mini-TCPA
Gov. Ron Desantis recently signed amendments that will roll back Florida's mini-Telephone Consumer Protection Act by getting rid of the capacious definition of an autodialer, leaving the courts to sort out where the lines fall in Florida Telephone Solicitation Act litigation, says Aaron Weiss at Carlton Fields.
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Perspectives
How Attorneys Can Help Combat Anti-Asian Hate
Amid an exponential increase in violence against Asian American and Pacific Islander communities, unique obstacles stand in the way of accountability and justice — but lawyers can effect powerful change by raising awareness, offering legal representation, advocating for victims’ rights and more, say attorneys at Gibson Dunn.
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Opinion
Congress Needs To Enact A Federal Anti-SLAPP Statute
Although many states have passed statutes meant to prevent individuals or entities from filing strategic lawsuits against public participation, other states have not, so it's time for Congress to enact a federal statute to ensure that free speech and petitioning rights are uniformly protected nationwide in federal court, say attorneys at Skadden.
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5 Insider-Threat Reminders After Recent DOJ Prosecutions
Three recent U.S. Department of Justice actions may well lead to much greater scrutiny of companies in which insiders engage in a variety of corporate misconduct, including conducting or enabling cybercrimes, which will likely fall not just on government contractors, but across industries and geographies, say attorneys at Paul Weiss.
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Financial Industry Must Beware Rising BIPA Litigation Tide
As Biometric Information Privacy Act litigation engulfs more financial institutions, it’s important that they evaluate their practices for collecting biometric data, and to consider whether their vendors should comply with BIPA’s requirements, and even some related California laws, say attorneys at Katten.
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New FTC Policy On Biometric Information Creates New Risks
In the absence of a comprehensive national data privacy regime, a new Federal Trade Commission policy shows the agency’s willingness to take action against companies using biometrics in ways the FTC deems unfair, but the guidance creates more questions than answers, and some of it appears unrealistic, say attorneys at Faegre Drinker.
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Some Client Speculations On AI And The Law Firm Biz Model
Generative artificial intelligence technologies will put pressure on the business of law as it is structured currently, but clients may end up with more price certainty for legal services, and lawyers may spend more time being lawyers, says Jonathan Cole at Melody Capital.
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What's New In NIST Revised Sensitive Info Security Guidelines
The National Institute of Standards and Technology's recently released draft of revised guidelines for government contractors and other entities handling sensitive unclassified federal information includes changes to enhance the specificity and user-friendliness of existing controls, but there is room for improvement, says Adam Briscoe at Bass Berry.
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Section 214 Order Solidifies FCC's Role In National Security
In its recent approval of an order to collect foreign ownership information from international Section 214 authorization holders, the Federal Communications Commission demonstrates its formal commitment to improving efforts to protect national security and international telecommunications services, say attorneys at Mayer Brown.
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Private Equity Firms Shouldn't Overlook Cybersecurity Risks
Given the operational, financial and reputational costs at stake, and the growing threat of cybercrime, cybersecurity should be central to deal making, internal governance and post-acquisition management for private equity firms, say Ray Bogenrief and William Ridgway at Skadden.
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Prepping To Comply With Online Marketplace Data Law
With a new federal law that requires online marketplaces to verify third-party seller information taking effect next month, now is the time for retailers to plan for compliance, assess potential enforcement tactics and the interplay between state and federal law, and rethink relationships with state attorneys general, says Jason Downs at Brownstein Hyatt.
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Metaverse Presents New Challenges For Data Preservation
With regulators increasingly requesting data — and recordings — from virtual meeting applications, and cracking down on employee use of ephemeral messaging, companies have hints of what's to come for metaverse-generated data and should consider the technological capabilities of the metaverse and governance of its data, says Timothy Taylor at Holland & Knight.
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BIPA Ruling Furthers Mixed Signals On Insurance Coverage
A recent Illinois appellate ruling in Remprex provides another perspective on the issue of insurance coverage for Biometric Information Privacy Act lawsuits, but its reach will be limited, as it did not cover the three exceptions that have been the focus of related federal court decisions, says Charles Insler at HeplerBroom.
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A Lawyer's Guide To Approaching Digital Assets In Discovery
The booming growth of cryptocurrency and non-fungible tokens has made digital assets relevant in many legal disputes but also poses several challenges for discovery, so lawyers must garner an understanding of the technology behind these assets, the way they function, and how they're held, says Brett Sager at Ehrenstein Sager.
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How Tenn. Privacy Law Nuances Could Affect Compliance
Tennessee’s recently enacted data privacy law is similar to statutes passed in other states, but also contains its own nuances that could change how a business needs to comply, such as data protection impact assessments and an affirmative defense for violations, say attorneys at Lewis Rice.