Privacy & Information Security Law Blog

On November 9, 2009, Connecticut’s Attorney General, Richard Blumenthal, announced an investigation of whether Blue Cross and Blue Shield (“BCBS”) violated Connecticut’s data breach notification law by waiting until two months after a data breach had occurred to notify affected Connecticut residents.  The data breach, which Attorney General Blumenthal called “one of the most sizable and significant in Connecticut’s history,” involved the theft of a laptop containing confidential unencrypted data from the car of a BCBS employee in late August.  BCBS notified affected Connecticut residents of the breach in late October.

The mere increased risk of identity theft following a data breach is sufficient to give the data subjects standing to bring a lawsuit in federal court but, absent actual identity theft or other actual harm, claims against the data owner and its service provider for negligence and breach of contract cannot survive, a federal judge ruled this month.  Ruiz v. Gap, Inc., et al., No. 07-5739 SC (N.D. Cal. April 6, 2009).

The New Jersey Division of Consumer Affairs has published a pre-proposal of rules relating to the protection of personal information (“PPR”) and is accepting comments on the PPR until February 13, 2009, after which it will formally propose rules. The PPR comes nearly a year after the state withdrew earlier proposed rules (the “Original Proposal”) that drew fire from the business community for the burdens they would have imposed. Among other obligations, the PPR would (i) require implementation of a comprehensive written security program; (ii) impose security breach ...

New York State recently enacted legislation restricting the use of Social Security numbers (“SSNs”) by employers. The legislation takes effect on January 3, 2009.