The Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act, enacted in 2008, was designed to provide individuals with control over their biometric information and to establish standards for collection. The Illinois Supreme Court has recently issued three opinions interpreting provisions of the BIPA, two of which are likely to result in a spike in BIPA claims and related litigation.

The Nigerian prince seems almost quaint.

Gone are the days when the Nigerian prince was the only nefarious figure menacing our inboxes.  A simple yet elegant scheme – our supposed prince unexpectedly fell upon a large sum of money, left behind by a fallen war hero, bequeathed by a terminally-ill spouse, or, perhaps, borne from the fruits of new age oil exploration. The funds are (somehow) rightfully yours, but a bureaucratic quagmire has them tied up, and they cannot be released until you pay a *small* fee. Just send a few million dollars to a specified bank account, and the endless riches are yours.

Recent amendments to Pennsylvania’s data breach law -- the Breach of Personal Information Notification Act – will take effect May 3. The amendments were enacted in November.

Originally enacted in 2006, the Act provides for the security of computerized data and requires notification to Pennsylvania residents whose personal information data was, or may have been, disclosed due to a breach of the security of an entity’s system. 

The life cycle of a data security incident begins and ends with preparation.

Unfortunately, there is no such thing as a network or system with “zero vulnerabilities.” There are jokes about absolute network security, including that the only secure network is one without users or one with no access. There is no perfect code, no perfect software, no perfect hardware, and even the most well-intentioned user can be socially engineered. Consequently, preparation at all levels of information security is critical to protect businesses from catastrophic attacks.