Airplane Image

Following a security incident involving its website’s chat function, Delta filed suit in the Southern District of New York against its tech vendor, [24]7.ai. Delta alleged fraud, negligence and breach of contract. A consumer class action lawsuit had already been filed against Delta in the Northern District of Georgia, related to the same incident.

According to the Complaint, on March 28, 2018, Delta was notified by [24]7.ai that a security incident had potentially compromised personally identifying information and payment card data of up to 825,000 of Delta’s customers. Delta alleges that “at least one third-party attacker gained access to Defendants’ computer networks and modified the source code of Defendants’ chat services software to enable the attacker to ‘scrape’ PII and payment card data from individuals using websites of Defendants’ clients, including Delta’s website…” Delta engaged a forensics team and began working with federal law enforcement upon receiving notice from [24]7.ai. Delta then publicly announced the breach, notified its customers, launched free credit monitoring services, and filed a lawsuit against [24]7.ai. Delta is seeking reimbursement of all breach-related costs.  Continue Reading Delta Airlines Sues Vendor for Data Breach

Q and A image 82

This blog post is the third in a series of Q&A posts following Dykema’s February 27, 2019 webinar on the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”). The statute takes effect on January 1, 2020–which is less than six months away. Please feel free to reach out to us if you have a unique question or would like to discuss in detail how the CCPA may apply to you.

You may see our first and second posts here and here.

Thanks for reading!

Continue Reading February 27, 2019, CCPA Webinar Q&As: Private Claims Under the CCPA

Untitled design

Over the last few months, we have been presenting and reporting on the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), the county’s first comprehensive state law designed to give consumers significant control over the personal data that companies collect. Not to be outdone, New York is working on data privacy legislation that imposes even heavier burdens on companies that collect consumer information.

The proposed New York Privacy Act (NYPA), Senate Bill S5642, sponsored by Democrat Kevin Thomas, has not yet been passed. If it passes in its current form, however, it would impose the strictest requirements in the country relating to companies’ collection, maintenance, use, and disclosure of consumer information.  Continue Reading New York Data-Privacy Proposal More Stringent than California’s CCPA

Data Protection Image

April was another busy month for legislative activity on the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), following a very busy February [see our prior post here]. A proposed sweeping revision to the CCPA, AB 1760, was withdrawn, while three key amendments, AB 25, AB 873, and AB 874, are up for a floor vote. Meanwhile, SB 561, which greatly expands the private right of action under the CCPA, is now in the Senate Appropriations Committee’s Suspense File awaiting a May 17, 2019 deadline for a vote as to whether it makes it out of the Suspense File.  Continue Reading CCPA Watch: Proposed Sweeping Overhaul Withdrawn, Three Amendments Providing Key Clarifications Remain Pending

Utah Image

Utah enacted a sweeping data privacy law that affects how employers and corporations respond to police demands for data. With this new law, Utah becomes the first state to protect electronic information individuals disclose to third parties.

Utah’s law requires a search warrant for a law enforcement agency conducting a criminal investigation or prosecution to obtain (i) location information, stored data, or transmitted data of an electronic device or (ii) electronic information or data transmitted by the owner of the electronic information or data to a remote computing processing center. The law further provides that any use of the information gathered must be related to the subject or objective of the warrant.  Continue Reading Utah Sets Limits on Law Enforcement’s Ability to Gather Individuals’ Electronically Transmitted Data

Biometric Privacy Image 610

After the Illinois Supreme Court’s decision in January holding that a plaintiff need not show actual harm to be an “aggrieved person” under the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (“BIPA”), parties litigating under BIPA have been testing other defenses. One of those defenses is whether BIPA matters can be compelled to arbitration pursuant to an arbitration provision set forth in the parties’ agreement.

On Tuesday, April 9, the First District Appellate Court of Illinois issued its decision in Liu v. Four Seasons Hotel, Ltd., 2019 IL App (1st) 182645, holding that a BIPA claim could not be compelled to arbitration based on the language of the employment agreement at issue. Specifically, the employment agreement provided that a dispute was subject to mandatory, binding arbitration if it “is based on one of the following types of claims as defined by law:  (a) employment discrimination; (b) harassment as it relates to my employment; (c) a wage or hour violation; (d) or termination of my employment from the Hotel.” Defendant argued that plaintiffs’ BIPA claim was a “wage or hour” dispute because the scans of plaintiffs’ fingerprints were used to track the hours the plaintiffs worked and therefore, it was an “hour” violation claim. The appellate court disagreed.  Continue Reading Arbitration Clauses & BIPA: The Broader the Better

Q and A image 821

This blog post is the second in a series of Q&A posts following Dykema’s February 27, 2019 webinar on the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”).  We received questions both before and during the webinar, and over the coming weeks we will be posting our responses. We will answer the most commonly-asked questions first, so please stay tuned if you don’t see your question in our first few posts. And, of course, please feel free to reach out to us if you have a unique question or would like to discuss in detail how the CCPA may apply to you.

You may see our first post here.

Thanks for reading!

Continue Reading February 27, 2019 CCPA Webinar Q&As: Third-Parties & Due Diligence

Illinois Capitol Building Image

Data privacy litigation is not a new frontier. The Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (“BIPA”) has provided a private right of action for the improper collection of biometric information from Illinois citizens without consent since 2008. Even so, employers and businesses alike were caught off-guard when plaintiffs began filing class actions complaints alleging BIPA violations in 2015. Defendants scored early victories in these cases, as evidenced in the Second District Appellate Court opinion finding that actual harm, and not merely a procedural violation, must be alleged to state a claim under the Act. That ruling placed the viability of private suits under BIPA in serious doubt—because actual harm from an improper collection of biometric information is not easily pled. But then in January 2019, the Illinois Supreme Court reversed the defendant-friendly intermediate appellate ruling and held that mere procedural violations of BIPA standing alone were sufficient to withstand a motion to dismiss. That ruling breathed new life into this pattern litigation, as recent docket filings show.  Continue Reading Is the Illinois Legislature Rethinking BIPA?

Questions and Answers Image 1

This blog post is the first in a series of Q&A posts following Dykema’s February 27, 2019 webinar on the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”). We received questions both before and during the webinar, and over the coming weeks we will be posting our responses. We will answer the most commonly-asked questions first, so please stay tuned if you don’t see your question in the first one or two posts. And, of course, please feel free to reach out to us if you have a unique question or would like to discuss in detail how the CCPA may apply to you.

Thanks for reading!  Continue Reading February 27, 2019 CCPA Webinar Q&As: Out-of-State, B2B, and GLBA-Covered Businesses

Biometric Image 71

The fallout from the Illinois Supreme Court’s January 25, 2019, opinion in Rosenbach v. Six Flags Entertainment Corp., 19 IL 12316, continues. Rosenbach settled the dispute of who qualifies as an “aggrieved person” under the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (“BIPA”), and in doing so opened the floodgates for this litigation to proliferate. The immediate result was a sharp increase in the filing of BIPA class actions as well as the lifting of stays of the numerous cases pending that were awaiting the Rosenbach ruling.  Continue Reading All Stop: Ruling on the Applicability of Exclusion to BIPA Claims Delayed