Happy Cyber Monday!

In honor of Computer Security Day (which was Saturday), we have a quiz designed to test your grasp of key laws, regulations, and best practices that keep your personal, financial, and sensitive information safe.

Financial institutions are now required to notify the Federal Trade Commission about any security breach that involves the information of 500 customers or more. The breach must be reported no later than 30 days after it is discovered.

Joseph Sullivan, Uber’s beleaguered former Chief Information Security Officer, was back in the news last month when he appealed his 2023 conviction for his role in concealing a 2016 breach of Uber’s network and customer data. 

New York’s Cybersecurity Regulation continues its phased roll-out on November 1, when licensed financial services companies face a host of new requirements aimed at bolstering breach readiness and improving their ability to recover from disastrous situations. Companies will be required to put in writing how they would address several common pressure points in the breach response and mitigation process – including how they plan to recover from backups if critical data is lost.

Data breaches have become a serious issue for businesses, leading to numerous putative class action lawsuits alleging that the defendants failed to prevent the unauthorized disclosure of personally identifiable information or protected health information of their employees or customers.

The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania has amended its Breach of Personal Information Notification Act. The amendments, available here 2024 Act 33 - PA General Assembly (state.pa.us), took effect last week, on September 26. The key provisions are as follows:

On April 24, the Federal Trade Commission announced that it had finalized changes to its Health Breach Notification Rule - to address emerging technologies.

Specifically, the Rule was broadened to (1) apply to entities not currently subject to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, (2) clarify what a breach of security is, (3) expand notification methods, (4) impose additional requirements for the content of notifications, and (5) amend the timeframe for issuing required notifications to the FTC.

Minnesota has become the 18th state to enact a comprehensive consumer privacy law. On May 24, Gov. Tim Walz (D) signed the Minnesota Consumer Data Privacy Act into law to provide privacy rights to Minnesotans and to impose new requirements on businesses and organizations handling personal data. For most covered entities, the law will go into effect on July 31, 2025.

The State of Utah recently amended its general data breach notification statute to update the content that must be reported to the Utah Attorney General or the Utah Cyber Center. The amendments also clarify when notifications can be considered confidential or classified under the state’s public records law.

The ever-increasing privacy and security risks via third-party vendors and service providers were apparent in 2023 with news of large organizations such as MOVEit, Okta and AT&T being affected. Research has shown that 98 percent of organizations have at least one third-party vendor that experienced a cyber incident within the past two years. With this growing trend, it is increasingly important for organizations to develop robust third-party risk management programs and to consistently review their third-parties to safeguard against security threats and ensure the security and privacy of their data.