The Departmental Appeals Board of the Department of Health and Human Services (“Board”) has granted summary judgment against the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center (“Center”) and upheld the imposition of $4.3 million dollars in penalties against the Center for violations of HIPAA’s privacy and security rules.  In this case, the personal medical data of more than 33,000 individuals was exposed through the theft of a laptop and the loss of unencrypted thumb drives.  None of these devices was encrypted, and the laptop was not password protected. Continue Reading Appeals Board Upholds $4.3 Million in HIPAA Penalties Against Hospital

On June 27, 2018, Ballard Spahr partner David Stauss will speak at the Practicing Law Institute’s inaugural Internet of Things Conference in San Francisco. The full-day conference is also available via webcast.

The program will bring together industry leaders to discuss various issues with the rapidly changing landscape of IoT devices.  In his panel, “Cybersecurity & Privacy: What are the Risks of IoT Devices and how Privacy Rights can be Protected,” Mr. Stauss and his co-panelists will explore the emerging government and industry regulation surrounding IoT devices, including FTC action and guidance and proposed state, federal and international laws and regulations.

Ballard Spahr has two complimentary passes available for the conference. Interested individuals should email Mr. Stauss directly at staussd@ballardspahr.com.

With more than double the number of required signatures well ahead of the verification deadline late this month, the citizen-initiated measure “The California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018” appears headed for the statewide ballot on November 6. If approved by a majority of Golden State voters, the ballot measure would greatly expand right-to-know and opt-out requirements, subjecting covered businesses to increased costs for compliance and strict liability for any violations.

Continue Reading California Voters Likely to Consider Enacting GDPR-Like Privacy Law in November

Last week, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (“OCC”) published the Spring 2018 Semiannual Risk Perspective (the “Report”), which uses up-to-date data to identify risks to U.S. banks and measure their compliance with applicable laws and regulations.  The Report concluded that some of the OCC’s primary concerns are with the elevation in operational risk “as banks adapt business models, transform technology and operating processes, and respond to evolving cyber threats.”  The Report also focused on elevated compliance risk associated with bank efforts to “manage money-laundering risks in a complex environment.”

Many of the OCC’s observations and recommendations remained the same from its Fall 2017 report, leaving readers to wonder what will spur less conversation and potentially more action among OCC-supervised banks or concrete guidance by the OCC.  Regardless, a common thread running throughout both reports is the potential risk presented to financial institutions by emerging technologies, which carry the simultaneous blessing and curse of greater business opportunities, but also greater operational and compliance risks. Continue Reading OCC Semiannual Risk Perspective Highlights Cybersecurity, Fraud, Money Laundering Concerns

Colorado has enacted groundbreaking privacy and cybersecurity legislation that will require covered entities to implement and maintain reasonable security procedures, dispose of documents containing confidential information properly, ensure that confidential information is protected when transferred to third parties, and notify affected individuals of data breaches in the shortest time frame in the country. The new law was spearheaded by the Colorado Attorney General’s office, which is charged with enforcing its requirements. As a result of the legislation, covered entities should consider implementing written information security programs, third party vendor management controls, and incident response plans to best position themselves against potential enforcement actions and civil litigation in the future.

Ballard Spahr attorneys David Stauss and Gregory Szewczyk will host a webinar on Monday, June 4, 2018, at noon PT/1 p.m. MT/3 p.m. ET to provide an in-depth analysis of the new law and to discuss what covered entities must do to ensure compliance. Messrs. Stauss and Szewczyk are uniquely situated to discuss the new law, having assisted in developing the legislation, including Mr. Stauss testifying on the bill in front of the House Committee on State, Veterans, & Military Affairs. Click here for more information and to register.

The most notable provisions of the new law are discussed below.

Continue Reading Colorado Enacts Groundbreaking Privacy and Cybersecurity Legislation

What happened?

Today the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) goes into effect, ending the data protection landscape as we know it. This comprehensive privacy law applies directly to the 28 EU countries and companies established in or doing business in those countries. Unlike its predecessor, the GDPR applies to companies established outside of the EU that offer goods or services to individuals in the EU or monitor the behavior of individuals in the EU, such as through the use of cookies. The GDPR imposes a number new of requirements on companies and raises the stakes by imposing potential maximum fines up to 4% of worldwide revenue. Continue Reading GDPR is Now Effective – How Will Regulators Enforce It?

In April, we blogged about the potential impact of the GDPR—which goes into effect this week (May 25)—on the public availability of WHOIS data. Ballard Spahr Intellectual Property attorney Tyler Marandola continues the discussion about WHIOS data in a recent interview with the CyberLaw and Business Report. Listen to it here.

One practical takeaway: if you have WHOIS searching to do, you should do it this week and save the results. WHOIS is likely to look very different (essentially just Organization Name and State/Province) as early as mid-next week.

South Carolina has become the first state to enact a version of the Insurance Data Security Model Law, which was drafted by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) in 2017. Governor Henry McMaster signed the South Carolina Insurance Data Security Act into law on May 14, 2018. The Act will become effective on January 1, 2019.

South Carolina Insurance Director Raymond G. Farmer chaired the NAIC Cybersecurity Working Group that drafted the model law. The South Carolina Act appears to follow the Model Law closely, and bears similarities to cybersecurity laws and regulations enacted in other states and at the federal level – including the New York Department of Financial Services cybersecurity regulations, the new Alabama data breach law, and HIPAA/HITECH data security/breach notification requirements. Continue Reading South Carolina Enacts First Insurance Data Security Act

A celebrity collapses on stage and is rushed to the hospital. Rumors race through social media faster than the ambulance can navigate city streets. Was it exhaustion? Was it her heart? Was there a gunshot? The press broadcasts through the night outside the ER. You are a hospital administrator who has access to information about the celebrity’s medical condition and treatment. You stay past your shift until the patient’s condition is stable and the 11 p.m. news reports have finished. You exit through a side door to avoid attention, but a man comes up alongside you. You know him from some prior incidents. He is an insurance investigator for the arena where the celebrity was performing. He asks you questions, seeking to confirm facts for a preliminary report he is filing.  All of the facts that he recites about the celebrity’s condition are true. All of them have been widely reported already. You keep quiet.

You have been well trained. That is what you should do. Continue Reading HIPAA: Privacy Required, Even When Information Goes Public

You can log into your account worldwide!

The fallout from the Yahoo data breaches continues to illustrate how cyberattacks thrust companies into the competing roles of crime victim, regulatory enforcement target and civil litigant.

Yahoo, which is now known as Altaba, recently became the first public company to be fined ($35 million) by the Securities and Exchange Commission for filing statements that failed to disclose known data breaches. This is on top of the $80 million federal securities class action settlement that Yahoo reached in March 2018—the first of its kind based on a cyberattack. Shareholder derivative actions remain pending in state courts, and consumer data breach class actions have survived initial motions to dismiss and remain consolidated in California for pre-trial proceedings. At the other end of the spectrum, a federal judge has balked at the U.S. Department of Justice’s (DOJ) request that a hacker-for-hire indicted in the Yahoo attacks be sentenced to eight years in prison for a digital crime spree that dates back to 2010. Continue Reading The Hacked & the Hacker-for-Hire: Lessons from the Yahoo Data Breaches (So Far)