In what appears to be a growing trend, Vermont and Connecticut have added a requirement to separately notify the states’ Attorney General’s office of a data breach involving the personal information of Vermont and Connecticut residents. Last year, California amended its data breach notification statute with a similar requirement.
Vermont’s amended Security Breach Notification Act, revised on May 8, 2012, not only added the attorney general notification requirement, it also revised the trigger for notification from unauthorized “acquisition or access” of personally identifiable information to simply unauthorized access. Further, the statute provides a number of factors to consider when assessing whether personally identifiable information has been acquired. Thus, while raising the requirement of what an entity possessing the personal data of Vermont residents must do in the event of a security breach, the Vermont legislature also attempted to clarify what constitutes a security breach.
Connecticut’s revisions take effect on October 1, 2012. The amended statute requires any entity that is obligated to disclose a security breach to residents or owners or licensees of the personal data of Connecticut residents to provide notice of the breach to the Attorney General not later than the time notice is provided to the resident, owner or licensee.
With the addition of Vermont and Connecticut, there are now 17 U.S. jurisdictions which require data breach notification to the Attorney General or other state official.
Written by Bruce Sarkisian, Associate | Alston & Bird LLP