Individuals who serve as a fiduciaries to their company’s retirement plan often feel they may not be sufficiently informed or qualified to make prudent decisions for the plan. They might ask themselves: “How do I know which are prudent investments?” or “What amount of plan fees are ‘reasonable’”? Now, the DOL is requiring plan fiduciaries

In April, we posted about the U.S. Department of Labor’s (DOL) Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA) issuing cybersecurity guidance for employee retirement plans. That is, April 14, 2021. Shortly thereafter, the DOL updated its audit inquiries to include probing questions for plan fiduciaries about their compliance with “hot off the press” agency guidelines.

So, what

By now, plan fiduciaries and their service providers likely have heard about the DOL’s cybersecurity guidance. The Department of Labor’s stepping into cybersecurity in this way – a posting of best practices on the agency’s website – has left plan fiduciaries with some questions. Here are a few:

  • “When is this effective?”
  • “Does this

The Texas Legislature, which meets every other year, pushed a change to its data breach notification law at the end of the session in late May, and yesterday Governor Greg Abbott signed the bill into law.  It follows a growing trend of changes to privacy and cybersecurity laws at the state level.

Texas House Bill

UPDATE: On June 16, Gov. Ned Lamont signed HB 5310 into law which becomes effective October 1, 2021.

State legislatures across the nation are prioritizing privacy and security matters, and Connecticut is no exception. This week, Connecticut Attorney General William Tong announced the passage of An Act Concerning Data Privacy Breaches, a measure that

In late May, New York Attorney General Letitia James announced a $200,000 settlement agreement with Filters Fast, an online water filtration retailer, stemming from a 2019 data breach compromising the personal information of over 300,000 consumers across the U.S., including nearly 17,000 in New York state.  The settlement also requires the online retailer to strengthen

On May 12, 2021, the Biden Administration issued an Executive Order on “Improving the Nation’s Cybersecurity” (EO). The EO was in the works prior to the Colonial Pipeline cyberattack, reportedly a ransomware incident that snarled the flow of gas on the east coast for days. Ransomware attacks are nothing new, but they are increasing in

As we noted in our last post, there has been a flurry of data privacy and security activity in New York, with the State appearing poised to join California as a leader in this space.  Most recently, on April 29, 2021, the New York City Council passed the Tenant Data Privacy Act (“TDPA”), which

Effective July 9, 2021, certain retail and hospitality businesses that collect and use “biometric identifier information” from customers will need to post conspicuous notices near all customer entrances to their facilities.  These businesses will also be barred from selling, leasing, trading, sharing or otherwise profiting from the biometric identifier information they collect from customers.  Customers

In a recent post, we highlighted the need for a privacy and cybersecurity training program, one not solely focused on spotting phishing attempts (although that is quite important as well). A primary reason, quite simply, is that employees continue to be a leading cause of data breaches. This fact was reaffirmed for the Wyoming