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California Actively Enforcing its Delete Act against Data Brokers
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March 10, 2025
California Actively Enforcing its Delete Act against Data Brokers
By: Nicole Kardell
If you are a data broker and you are not registered in California, you may face sanctions, including fines and possible shut down of operations. The California Privacy Protection Agency is actively enforcing the state’s Delete Act, legislation that was enacted in 2023. The Delete Act requires entities that qualify as data brokers under the law to register annually with the CPPA and pay the associated fee. In October 2024, the CPPA announced that it would start a sweep to investigate and penalize data brokers that failed to comply. Making good on its promise, the agency recently released a statement that it settled with a data broker, Background Alert, Inc., for failing to register. The settlement requires the company to…
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FTC Cracking Down On Online Censorship
February 27, 2025
FTC Cracking Down On Online Censorship
By: Steven Eichorn
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has recently launched a public outreach effort to obtain information from the public regarding how they are treated by technology platforms. As explained by the FTC, they are seeking to “understand how technology platforms deny or degrade users’ access to services based on the content of their speech or affiliation, and how this conduct may have violated the law.” This…
Pause Play? CFPB Gaming-Related Rules on Hold
February 12, 2025
Pause Play? CFPB Gaming-Related Rules on Hold
By: Michelle Cohen
Newly installed Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”) Director Russell Vought directed agency staff to stop work on agency matters and stay home. The future of many of the CFPB-led initiatives looks bleak, including a recent interpretive rule proposal that would treat video game publishers like payment processors. Background Congress created the CFPB, an independent federal agency, in 2011 in response to the financial crisis of…
Eleventh Circuit Assumes FTC’s Data Security Enforcement Authority, But Mandates Specificity for FTC Orders
June 20, 2018
Eleventh Circuit Assumes FTC’s Data Security Enforcement Authority, But Mandates Specificity for FTC Orders
By: Michelle Cohen
On June 6, 2018, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit issued a landmark ruling in LabMD v. Federal Trade Commission. While the Eleventh Circuit impliedly held that the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) has authority to take enforcement action against companies whose unfair practices lead to data security incidents that pose substantial injury to consumers, it severely curtailed the FTC’s ability…
FTC Focuses on Kids’ Geo-Location Devices in Latest COPPA Warnings
May 8, 2018
FTC Focuses on Kids’ Geo-Location Devices in Latest COPPA Warnings
By: Ifrah Law
A public service announcement of yesteryear posed the following question to parents: “It’s 8:00. Do you know where your children are?” Today’s technology allows parents to answer that question regardless of the time of day. That technology, however, has recently drawn scrutiny for violating the parental notice and consent provisions of the Federal Trade Commission’s (“FTC’s”) Children’s Online Privacy Protection Rule (“COPPA”). Last week, the…
Facebook and the FTC: A Wake-Up Call for Companies Collecting Personal Data
March 21, 2018
Facebook and the FTC: A Wake-Up Call for Companies Collecting Personal Data
By: Michelle Cohen
The FTC is reported to be joining state and international regulators in examining Cambridge Analytica’s actions with data accessed from Facebook, including how the data analytics company obtained the information, what it did with the information, and whether Facebook complied with existing obligations, including a 2012 FTC consent decree. The situation underscores the importance of and need for clearly defined regulations governing corporate practices like…
Full Metal Cryptojacket
February 28, 2018
Full Metal Cryptojacket
By: James Trusty
In retrospect, it all seems so predictable. International capitalism creates virtual currencies. Banks are avoided. Millennials hail a new world order of anonymous or nearly untraceable market transactions. Numerous parties and exchanges hold on to large quantities of virtual currencies. But then the bad guys show up. And I’m not talking about the regulators. Last month, in what looks like the biggest cryptocurrency breach in history, hackers stole over $534 million…
Coming Soon: Digital Asset Regulation
February 20, 2018
Coming Soon: Digital Asset Regulation
By: George Calhoun
In January, Bitcoin dropped to approximately 50% of its 2017 peak price. Other digital currencies saw similar declines. Most market observers blamed these massive price fluctuations on related events: (i) widespread reports of fraud and price manipulation, and (ii) increasing prospects for the regulation of digital assets and currencies. Indeed, 2018 has brought us federal charges against fraudulent coin offerings and public statements by the…