Sen. Moran Reintroduces Legislation to Create Clear Federal Standard for Consumer Data Privacy

WASHINGTON - U.S. Senator Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) - a member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation - today reintroduced the Consumer Data Privacy and Security Act, legislation to strengthen the laws that govern consumers' personal data and create clear standards and regulations for American businesses that collect, process and use consumers' personally identifiable data.

"More and more Americans are recognizing the need for a clear federal standard for data privacy that guarantees them the ability to determine how their personal data is used," said Sen. Moran. "U.S. consumers need to be able to count on strong baseline standards that businesses must uphold when collecting, processing and protecting their personally identifiable information. Without action from Congress, consumers will continue to be vulnerable to future threats against their personal data, and innovators and job creators will be plagued with regulatory uncertainty resulting from a growing patchwork of state laws. I urge my colleagues to support the Consumer Data Privacy and Security Act, and I look forward to receiving additional feedback on this legislation from consumers, industry leaders, and my colleagues in Congress as we strive to create a federal standard for comprehensive data privacy."

The Consumer Data Privacy and Security Act would:

• Establish a clear federal standard for data privacy protection - Gives businesses a uniform standard rather than a patchwork of confusing state laws.
• Provide consumers with control over their own data - Makes certain consumers can access, correct and erase their personal data.
• Create appropriately-scaled business requirements based on a company's size and resources - Requires businesses that collect and process a significant amount of personal data to take extra precautionary steps to protect and responsibly process that data.
• Require notification and consent measures - Prohibits companies from collecting data without consumers' consent with limited and specific exceptions.
• Implement robust security programs - Requires businesses to develop and implement robust data security programs to protect personal data from unauthorized access and disclosure.
• Equip the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and state attorneys general - Provides these entities with authority to uniformly enforce federal consumer privacy protections while providing the FTC with the resources necessary to carry out those authorities.

An overview of this legislation can be found here.

A detailed section-by-section of this legislation can be found here.

Full text of the legislation can be found here.

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