Cybersecurity & Privacy

  • October 10, 2024

    Feds Ask 18 Months For 'Razzlekhan's' Role In Crypto Hack

    The wife of a hacker who admitted to stealing what is now billions of dollars worth of bitcoin from the crypto exchange Bitfinex deserves 18 months in prison for her role in the heist, federal prosecutors say in a recommendation that takes her cooperation into account.

  • October 10, 2024

    Ga. Container Co. Hit With Data Breach Class Action

    A Georgia-based manufacturer and global supplier of blow-molded plastic containers was hit with a proposed class action in federal court over a December 2023 data breach that allegedly exposed the personal information of more than 30,000 people who were not notified about the hack until this month.

  • October 10, 2024

    Gunster Reaches Deal In One Of Two Data Breach Actions

    Gunster has struck a settlement agreement in one of the two proposed class actions it faces in Florida federal court over a 2022 data breach, while the plaintiffs in the second case urged the court the same day to reject the law firm's dismissal bid in their suit.

  • October 09, 2024

    RFK Jr. Jumps Into TikTok Ban Fight At DC Circ.

    Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has joined the fray in litigation at the D.C. Circuit challenging a federal law that could put TikTok out of business in the United States, contending in a new lawsuit that the sale-or-ban statute defies the First Amendment.

  • October 09, 2024

    Judge OKs $9M Data Hack Deal, Asks How Public Views Fees

    A Washington federal judge on Wednesday approved an $8.8 million settlement that ended a consolidated data breach class action against a Hearst Health unit, but not before pondering how the public might perceive the deal, in which one-third of the money is going toward legal costs.

  • October 09, 2024

    Kohl's Sued After Vendor Hack Leaks 1.9M Customers Files

    Kohl's department store customers hit the retail giant on Wednesday with a putative breach of implied contract class action in Pennsylvania federal court alleging the store failed to protect data from 1.9 million customers from a hack targeting a contractor the retailer uses for debt collection.

  • October 09, 2024

    Yale Must Answer Ex-Student's 'Execution' Fears, Judge Says

    A judge has ordered Yale University to respond to an expelled student's fears of execution if he is deported to Afghanistan as she mulls lifting a ban on naming a classmate who accused the ex-student of sexual assault in litigation connected to a key Title IX ruling.

  • October 09, 2024

    NY Mets Parent Co. Accused Of Selling Biometric Data For Profit

    Sterling Mets LP — the owner of the New York Mets baseball franchise — has been hit with a proposed class action alleging that it illegally shares biometric identifier information from Citi Field's visitors for a profit.

  • October 09, 2024

    Thomson Reuters Gets Initial OK On $27.5M Privacy Suit Deal

    A San Francisco federal judge Wednesday preliminarily approved Thomson Reuters' $27.5 million deal to settle a certified class action alleging that the information conglomerate violated the privacy rights of 40 million Californians by secretly collecting their data to sell "cradle-to-grave dossiers."

  • October 09, 2024

    Pa. Justices Delve Into Audiences For Facebook Posts

    Whether the public's right to access to school board members' controversial social media posts depends on the intended audience dominated oral argument at the Pennsylvania's Supreme Court on Wednesday in a resident's challenge of a court order shielding the content.

  • October 09, 2024

    Marriott Inks $52M Deal With States Over Guest Data Breach

    Marriott International Inc. has agreed to pay $52 million to nearly every U.S. state and bolster its data security practices to resolve parallel investigations by state attorneys general and the Federal Trade Commission over a massive data breach at the hotel's Starwood-branded properties.

  • October 09, 2024

    Settlement Ends Suit Over 'Unwanted' Insurance Agency Calls

    A Georgia-based insurance agency has reached a settlement with a proposed class that accused it of making "aggressive" telemarketing calls to seniors advertising final expense and life insurance products despite the seniors' requests that the calls stop or their status on the national do-not-call list.

  • October 08, 2024

    Ex-Uber Exec's Actions Smell Like Cover-Up, 9th Circ. Judge Says

    A Ninth Circuit panel appeared skeptical Tuesday of Uber's ex-security chief's effort to overturn his convictions for obstructing an investigation into an Uber data breach, with one judge saying the defendant's abrupt changes to Uber's policies "does smell to me like a cover-up."

  • October 08, 2024

    Jackson, Kagan Target Loper Bright In Ghost Gun Case

    U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was uncharacteristically quiet during initial arguments Tuesday over the federal government's authority to regulate ghost guns. While her colleagues debated whether kits of unassembled parts qualify as firearms, she waited patiently to post a different question: Can courts now toss agency interpretations they don't like?

  • October 08, 2024

    Congress Urged To Prevent Stalking Via Smart Car

    An auto technology trade group asked congressional leaders Tuesday to push through legislation that would allow car connectivity services to cut access to domestic abusers.

  • October 08, 2024

    House Oversight Chair Targets Khan's 'Political Activities'

    House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., put Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina M. Khan on blast Tuesday for participating in official events held by Democratic lawmakers running for reelection or higher office, castigating the leader of the FTC's Democratic majority for "partisan political activities."

  • October 08, 2024

    Mich. Judge Won't Halt EV Battery-Plant Build During Appeal

    A Michigan federal judge said Monday she will not lift an order forcing a town's leaders to abide by a development agreement with battery manufacturer Gotion Inc. while the town seeks a Sixth Circuit review of the decision.

  • October 08, 2024

    Exporting Chips To China Doesn't Merit 7 Years, 9th Circ. Told

    Counsel for a former UCLA electrical engineering professor urged the Ninth Circuit on Tuesday to reduce his seven-year prison sentence for illegally exporting high-powered semiconductor chips to China, saying the conduct did not amount to an evasion of national security controls.

  • October 08, 2024

    College Admins Beat Ex-Prof's Suit Over Race-Based Study

    Cleveland State University faculty defeated a former professor's suit alleging he was unlawfully fired for publishing research asserting intelligence differences between white and Black people, with an Ohio federal judge finding he was let go for abusing access to restricted data, not his research subject.

  • October 08, 2024

    AGs Slam TikTok With Youth Addiction, Fraud Claims

    More than a dozen states have sued TikTok, alleging the popular social media platform targets young users and manipulates them into becoming habitual users while downplaying the harmful effects it can have on mental health and development.

  • October 07, 2024

    Mednax Gets Final OK For $6M Data Breach Settlement

    A Florida federal judge on Friday gave the green light to Mednax's $6 million settlement putting to rest a proposed class action accusing the medical provider of failing to adequately protect patients' personal information from a 2020 phishing attack, calling the deal "fair, reasonable and adequate."

  • October 07, 2024

    Car Sharing App Getaround Faces BIPA Suit Over Facial Scans

    Car sharing platform Getaround Inc. is facing a proposed class action in Illinois federal court accusing the company of illegally gathering, storing and disseminating its users' facial geometry scans obtained through a mandatory verification process, in violation of the state's Biometric Information Privacy Act.

  • October 07, 2024

    FCC Needs To 'Harmonize' Cybersecurity, Mobile Group Says

    A key wireless industry group has urged the Federal Communications Commission to ensure the network cybersecurity plans required by the agency's recent 5G Fund order are applied evenly across all its deployment funding programs.

  • October 07, 2024

    Apple Doesn't Infringe Digital Identity Patents, Jury Finds

    A federal jury in Austin, Texas, has rejected a $361 million patent case from a longtime ExxonMobil employee who had targeted in-house cybersecurity hardware used in Apple iPhones.

  • October 07, 2024

    Epic Judge Orders Google To Let Rivals Set Up App Stores

    A California federal judge on Monday ordered Google to offer third-party options for downloading apps on Android phones, banned it from offering companies financial incentives to discourage competition with Google Play and blocked it from signing developer deals to have an app launch first or exclusively in its app store.

Expert Analysis

  • How BIS' Rule Seeks To Encourage More Voluntary Disclosure

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    Updated incentives, penalties and enforcement resources in the Bureau of Industry and Security's recently published final rule revising the Export Administration Regulations should help companies decide how to implement export control compliance programs and whether to disclose possible violations, say attorneys at Freshfields.

  • 8 Childhood Lessons That Can Help You Be A Better Attorney

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    A new school year is underway, marking a fitting time for attorneys to reflect on some fundamental life lessons from early childhood that offer a framework for problems that no legal textbook can solve, say Chris Gismondi and Chris Campbell at DLA Piper.

  • Navigating Complex Regulatory Terrain Amid State AG Races

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    This year's 10 attorney general elections could usher in a wave of new enforcement priorities and regulatory uncertainty, but companies can stay ahead of the shifts by building strong relationships with AG offices, participating in industry coalitions and more, say Ketan Bhirud and Dustin McDaniel at Cozen O’Connor.

  • Recent Securities Cases Highlight Risks In AI Disclosures

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    Increasing public disclosure about the use and risks of artificial intelligence, and related litigation asserting that such disclosures are false or misleading, suggest that issuers need to exercise great care with respect to how they describe the benefits of AI, say Richard Zelichov and Danny Tobey at DLA Piper.

  • Opinion

    This Election, We Need To Talk About Court Process

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    In recent decades, the U.S. Supreme Court has markedly transformed judicial processes — from summary judgment standards to notice pleadings — which has, in turn, affected individuals’ substantive rights, and we need to consider how the upcoming presidential election may continue this pattern, says Reuben Guttman at Guttman Buschner.

  • Navigating HHS' New Reproductive Healthcare Privacy Rule

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    The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' new final rule regarding protections for the privacy of reproductive health information will require regulated entities to grapple with difficult questions about whether to comply with state law requirements or federal privacy prohibitions, says Christine Chasse at Spencer Fane.

  • Series

    Playing Diplomacy Makes Us Better Lawyers

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    Similar to the practice of law, the rules of Diplomacy — a strategic board game set in pre-World War I Europe — are neither concise nor without ambiguity, and weekly gameplay with our colleagues has revealed the game's practical applications to our work as attorneys, say Jason Osborn and Ben Bevilacqua at Winston & Strawn.

  • Open Questions In Unsettled Geofence Warrant Landscape

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    The Fourth and Fifth Circuits recently reached radically divergent conclusions about the constitutionality of geofence warrants, creating an uncertain landscape in which defendants should assert and preserve the full range of conventional Fourth Amendment challenges, says Charles Fowler at McKool Smith.

  • A Look At 5 States' New Data Privacy Laws

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    With new data privacy laws in Utah, Florida, Texas, Oregon and Montana recently in effect or coming into force this year, state-level enforcement of data privacy creates significant challenges and risks for how businesses interact with employees and consumers, and for companies that provide and use technologies in multiple jurisdictions, say attorneys at Jenner & Block.

  • Antitrust In Retail: Why FTC Is Studying 'Surveillance Pricing'

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    The Federal Trade Commission's decision to study targeted "surveillance pricing" should provide greater clarity into the nature of the data aggregation industry, but also raises several issues, including whether these practices are in fact illegal under any established interpretations of U.S. antitrust law, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.

  • Mental Health First Aid: A Brief Primer For Attorneys

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    Amid a growing body of research finding that attorneys face higher rates of mental illness than the general population, firms should consider setting up mental health first aid training programs to help lawyers assess mental health challenges in their colleagues and intervene with compassion, say psychologists Shawn Healy and Tracey Meyers.

  • Licensing And Protections For Voice Actors In The Age Of AI

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    While two recently enacted California laws and other recent state and federal legislation largely focus on protecting actors and musicians from the unauthorized use of their digital likenesses by generative artificial intelligence systems, the lesser-known community of professional voice actors also stands to benefit, says attorney Scott Mortman.

  • 2 High Court Securities Cases Could Clarify Pleading Rules

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    In granting certiorari in a pair of securities fraud cases against Facebook and Nvidia, respectively, the U.S. Supreme Court has signaled its intention to align interpretations of the heightened pleading standard under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act amid its uneven application among the circuit courts, say attorneys at V&E.

  • What 2 Key Rulings Mean For Solicitation Under TCPA

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    Two recent rulings from federal district courts in New York and California — each of which came to a different conclusion — bring to light courts' continued focus on and analysis of when an alleged communication constitutes a solicitation under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, say Felix Shipkevich and Jessica Livingston at Shipkevich.

  • Series

    Collecting Art Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    The therapeutic aspects of appreciating and collecting art improve my legal practice by enhancing my observation skills, empathy, creativity and cultural awareness, says attorney Michael McCready.

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