Events

Alpha Roundtable: Privacy Law

Alpha is hosting a private, invite-only discussion for a select group of 20 Founders, CEOs and executives in Toronto focused on the implementation of new US privacy laws and how will affect Canadian and Canadian-based companies with customers in the US. The discussion will be led by Shawn Atkinson and Heather Sussman of Orrick and cover these sweeping changes and how it will dramatically change the risk profile for foreign companies doing business in California.

With the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), California has introduced sweeping changes to the U.S. privacy landscape. Businesses covered by the law must make new disclosures about the type of personal information they are collecting and how that information will be used. It also gives California residents new rights around their personal information, the “right to be forgotten” and the right to opt-out of the “sale” of personal information to third parties. Businesses not directly covered by the law may be swept in by sharing common control or branding with a company that is, or through contractual terms that business customers are pushing through to address their own compliance challenges. And California is just the first of many – more than 10 other US states have introduced similar bills, with one law already passing in Nevada. Companies that do business in or with Californians should evaluate whether and to what extent this law applies and if it does, chart a course toward compliance. While the private right of action is limited to certain breach situations, companies subject to the law face statutory penalties up to $7,500 per violation (e.g., per consumer affected) without any showing of harm)