The FCC has adopted a three-year pilot program that will disburse up to $200 million from the Universal Service Fund (USF) to schools and libraries seeking to cover eligible cybersecurity services and equipment. The pilot...more
In a unanimous decision recently released in Canadian Broadcasting Corp. v Named Person, the Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) allowed, in part, the appeal from the Court of Appeal of Québec (QCA), which had sealed virtually all...more
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has begun the process of informing over 70,000 taxpayers that their confidential tax information was leaked in a widespread breach by a former IRS contractor. Those impacted should take...more
On January 29, 2024, Charles E. Littlejohn was sentenced to five years in prison for committing one of the largest heists in the history of the federal government. Littlejohn did not steal gold or cash, but rather,...more
Key developments of interest over the last month include: Hong Kong: FSTB publishes consultation conclusions on virtual asset services providers licensing regime Europe: European Commission publishes proposal for Regulation...more
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) expanded the Identity Protection PIN Opt-In Program to all taxpayers who can verify their identities. Up until now the IRS provided an Identity Protection PIN Opt-In Program IP six-digit...more
The Social Security Administration (SSA) has announced the development of a portal that would allow financial institutions to join a planned real-time electronic system for verifying the identity of credit applicants. ...more
Primarily motivated by the several recent massive data breaches, Senate Democrats recently introduced a bill geared toward protecting Americans’ personal information against cyber attacks and to ensure timely notification and...more
No! It is a common misconception among the general public that someone always has to pay when there is a data breach. It is understandable that individuals affected by a data breach will be upset, distraught, and even angry....more
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) has levied a $1.5 million civil money penalty against a Missouri-based bank for alleged violations of Section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act....more
Considering the recent Equifax data breach which put an estimated 145.5 million American’s identity at risk, main stream media outlets are starting to ask an important question; if we can’t stop data breaches, how do we...more
Hardly a week goes by without another announcement of a high-profile data security breach. The list of data breaches impacting high-profile employers and their employees just in 2017 is long...more
Purpose - Distributed ledger technology (“DLT”), including the use of blockchain technology, has been touted as a way to create and validate digital identities that serve many of the same purposes that physical forms of...more
When data thieves steal payment card data, consumers suffer no legally cognizable injuries. Card issuers absorb the fraudulent charges and replace the affected cards. Because fraudulent charges are not billed to consumers,...more
In the early days of the Internet, I was not in the technology industry, instead I worked for a business consulting firm focusing on healthcare, telecommunications, nonprofits and government agencies. Our consulting firm...more
On August 25, 2016, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) announced that it had agreed to consent orders with a national bank based on its alleged unfair billing practices. The civil money penalty order will...more
The first of three Minnesota legislative committee deadlines arrives tonight at midnight. By the first deadline, a committee must act favorably upon a bill in its body of origin or the bill does not move forward. As a result,...more
The Minnesota Legislature had a short week, with no official business on Friday due to their Easter recess. The legislature will return on Tuesday, March 29, at noon. This week, committees continued to hear budget details...more
The IRS has expanded upon its prior position and announced that employers are permitted to provide identity protection services to their employees before a data breach occurs and without treating such services as income. IRS...more
Following several high-profile breaches of business and government databases affecting the personal information of millions of Americans (including the IRS’s "Get Transcript" app) many businesses, governmental agencies and...more
This past July marked the fifth anniversary of the creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), a period marked by sweeping changes to the regulatory and administrative environment in which financial...more
The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and the Defense Department announced this week that a Portland, OR based vendor has been selected to assist with breach notification and credit assistance for the almost 22 million...more
In response to the massive OPM data breach, the government has been searching for a vendor to provide identity protection services for the almost 22 million individuals affected. Bids were due last week, and the chosen vendor...more
As companies and governmental entities increasingly do business and store sensitive information in online or cloud-based environments, the risk of improper disclosure continues to grow. The unprecedented breach of the United...more