For the past few legislative sessions in New York, versions of the New York Privacy Act (the Act), Senate Bill 6701A/Assembly Bill 680B, have been under consideration. The Act passed through the Senate Consumer Protection Committee for the first time in 2021, but it was not brought to the Senate floor for a vote, nor did it move out of committee in the Assembly. The 2022 session commenced January 2022, and on Feb. 8, 2022, the bill was voted out of the Consumer Protection Committee in the Senate. It now proceeds to the Senate Internet and Technology Committee for further consideration. If history and developments in other states are any guide, 2022 could be the year that New York adopts a comprehensive data protection statute in the form of the Act.

New York has been inching in this direction for almost two decades. In 2005, New York was an early adopter of a data breach notification law, in the form of New York General Business Law §899-aa, following the example of other states that had adopted similar statutes, beginning with California in 2003. Then in 2017, New York became the first state in the nation to regulate data protection issues in a specific industry by regulation alone, without a new or revised enabling statute, in the form of 23 N.Y.C.R.R. Part 500, the Department of Financial Services’ Cybersecurity Requirements for Financial Services Companies. This development created dueling power centers in New York when it came to data protection. N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law §899-aa is administered by the New York Attorney General, whereas Part 500 is administered by the Department of Financial Services. Although §899-aa contains no substantive security requirements, the New York Attorney General, and other state attorneys general nationwide, have used statutory notification of a personal information security breach (for example, as required under §899-aa) as a springboard for investigations into and consent decrees concerning security practices at breached organizations.

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