Miscellaneous

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The 21st Century Cures Act directed the National Coordinator to “develop or support a trusted exchange framework, including a common agreement among health information networks nationally.” Fulfilling that mandate, the Office of the National Coordinator (“ONC”) for Health Information Technology released the “Trusted Exchange Framework and the Common Agreement” for…

With the new year just around the corner, retailers should make a resolution to learn more about EMV technology.  That’s because 2015 is slated to be the year EMV technology makes significant inroads in the United States, and retailers need to be prepared.  In this post, we answer some frequently asked questions about what the introduction of this new standard means for retailers and the steps they must take in order to prepare for the widespread adoption of this new technology.

As health care providers, patients, family members, friends, and disaster relief agencies such as the American Red Cross continue to grapple with the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy it is important to be mindful of privacy regulations and to prepare in advance for the next emergency. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act  of 1996 (“HIPAA” or “Privacy Rule”) protects individually identifiable health information held by “covered entities.” The information protected is referred to as protected health information or PHI. The Privacy Rule permits covered entities to disclose PHI for a variety of purposes including to (a) treat patients; (b) identify, locate and notify family members, guardians, or anyone else responsible for an individual’s care; (c) obtain the services of disaster relief agencies; (d) conduct public health activities; and (e) prevent or lessen serious and imminent threats to health or safety.

When Social Security Numbers were initially issued in 1936 as part of the New Deal Social Security program, few could foresee that this nine digit number would evolve beyond its limited purpose to become a universal identifier replete with privacy and identity theft implications. More and more, government agencies and private entities have required the disclosure of individuals SSNs to extend their services. While the Privacy Act of 1974 largely addressed the collection and dissemination of SSNs by and among federal government agencies, state law has governed such uses by private entities. This month Governor Andrew Cuomo signed legislation A.8992 to strengthen protection of SSNs by limiting the instances where persons and businesses are allowed to require New Yorkers to provide their SSNs or numbers derived from them. (This is in addition to New York’s SSN confidentiality statute, N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 399-dd*4, which is similar to laws in many states.)

Where U.S. litigation discovery obligations were argued to be in conflict with foreign civil and criminal privacy statutes, many recent opinions found that discovery should proceed under the Federal Rules over the protest of the foreign data custodians. However, in SEC v. Stanford International Bank Ltd, the court departed from this pattern in finding that discovery should first proceed under the Hague convention in the interest of comity. While it is unclear the extent to which this approach will be followed by other courts in the future, the Stanford opinion illustrates that it is possible for litigants and third parties to successfully navigate cross border discovery conflicts even where privacy interests are at stake.
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Our April 1, 2010 blog entry discussed the March 8, 2010 Order in Gucci Amer., Inc. v. Curveal Fashion, No. 09 Civ. 8458 (S.D.N.Y.) (the “Order”), compelling the third-party U.S. parent (the “U.S. Parent”) of a foreign bank, to produce documents located at its subsidiary, despite claims that such production was illegal under Malaysian banking secrecy laws. The entry concluded by noting the no-win situation that foreign corporations continue to be placed in by the tension between U.S. courts and foreign law. Subsequent history in this matter further illustrates the seriousness of this predicament.
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