The New York Times published an interesting front page article by Somini Sengupta on October 31, 2013 about the growing trend of state legislative action on privacy issues, noting that over two dozen privacy laws have passed this year in more than 10 states. The piece also notes that the “patchwork of rules across the country” is a burden on companies, which must “keep a close eye on evolving laws to avoid overstepping.”  The proliferation of state laws is a result of citizen concerns about privacy combined with Congressional gridlock. Some of the laws described in the piece include three online privacy laws passed in California just this year, “one gives children the right to erase social media posts, another makes it a misdemeanor to publish identifiable nude photos online without the subject’s permission, and a third requires companies to tell consumers whether they abide by ‘do not track’ signals on web browsers.”  The article is a good summary of the state of U.S. privacy regulation today. Expect more state legislative action in the future.