INSIGHT: Georgia Supreme Court Adds to Patchwork of State Data Privacy Laws
Timothy Butler, Mark Mao, Tiffany Bracewell and Chelsea Lamb were published in Bloomberg Law for an article titled, “INSIGHT: Georgia Supreme Court Adds to Patchwork of State Data Privacy Laws.” The article discusses the Georgia Supreme Court’s recent decision in McConnell v. Georgia Department of Labor, which held that businesses do not have a duty under Georgia law to safeguard the personally identifiable information (PII) that they collect and store. The authors point out that the McConnell decision adds to the ever-more complex patchwork of state data privacy laws and thus “bolsters the point made by many pro-business groups, the FTC, and several other federal agencies that Congress should enact comprehensive data privacy legislation.” Speaking as attorneys who regularly defend companies facing parallel government enforcement actions and class actions arising from data breaches, they argue that “federal legislation is sorely needed, but it must strike a balance that allows businesses to flourish without leaving consumers at the mercy of careless business practices.”