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Employers collect, store and manage more data about their employees than ever before, creating unprecedented privacy complexities as well as significant compliance issues. Evolving technologies designed to support employer efficiencies, such as digital monitoring and biometric authentication, as well as the collection and use of sensitive personal information for diversity initiatives and other employee programs, create new and novel risks.

Moreover, companies that previously had no need to collect sensitive health information from employees have grappled with issues relating to the collection of temperature data, vaccine information and COVID-19 test data, as well as the appropriate retention of this information, as a result of the global pandemic. 

In January 2023, through the enactment of the California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA), California became the first U.S. state to enact a comprehensive data privacy law covering employee data, bringing this data into the scope of one of the most rigid data protection regulations in the world. Employers face many challenges in managing associated compliance requirements for their California workforce, including the unstructured nature of employee data and the complicated intersection of data protection and employment laws. Less than a year after the CPRA took effect, the California Attorney General’s Office announced an investigation sweep into California employers’ compliance with these requirements, signaling that regulators are focused on employee data practices in addition to consumer data practices.


Select Experience

  • Successfully defending purported class action employee privacy claims resulting from an alleged data breach.
  • Obtaining dismissal of FCRA claims resulting from an alleged data breach.
  • Successfully litigating online defamation claims for businesses and obtaining an injunction prohibiting a former employee’s cyberattacks.
  • Winning a published appellate opinion breaking new ground on privacy and confidentiality.
  • Successfully litigating Illinois BIPA claims.
  • Advising companies concerning managing workplace data in the work-from-home and hybrid work environments, including internationally.
  • Advised on compliant design of employers’ COVID-19 health and safety programs, including the appropriate collection and retention of temperature, test and symptom data.
  • Counseling about, advising on compliance with and litigating matters involving interception and surveillance issues, including the CFAA, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, the Stored Communications Act and the Wiretap Act.
  • Litigating defamation, invasion of privacy, intrusion upon seclusion, public disclosure of private facts, false light and misappropriation claims.
  • Assisting clients with data retention and governance policies and practices.

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