Two years after a consumer protection law changed how banks and other companies handle customer information, a new proposal aims for more sweeping reforms.
It was just two years ago that California passed a groundbreaking data privacy law. Now the state’s voters have a chance to expand its protections.
The latest proposal, known as the California Privacy Rights Act, would create a state agency to serve as a privacy watchdog and would offer more rights to consumers. It would also create a raft of compliance work for banks and other companies, especially tech firms that rely heavily on users’ personal data.
The financial services industry would retain limited exemptions that were included in the earlier law.
The measure was approved this week for the statewide ballot in November after its backers obtained more than 623,000 signatures.
“We’ve come a long way in the two years since passing the landmark California Consumer Privacy Act,” Alastair Mactaggart, the lead backer of both measures, said in a press release. “But during these times of unprecedented uncertainty, we need to ensure that the laws keep pace with the ever-changing ways corporations and other entities are using our data.”
Californians for Consumer Privacy, the group that Mactaggart founded, obtained enough signatures in 2018 to put a sweeping data privacy proposal onto the statewide ballot.
