Florida Privacy Bill to Be Reconsidered Next Year

On April 30, 2021, the 2021 Florida legislative session ended without passing a privacy bill which will now likely be reconsidered next year.

Just nine days earlier, on April 21, 2021, the Florida House of Representatives had almost unanimously passed a version of the bill which would have imposed the CCPA-like compliance obligations on companies and created a broad private right of action for data breaches and companies’ failure to comply with the data subject requests to delete and correct information and to opt out of its sale.  The bill would have also allowed for attorney’s fees and costs if the consumers prevail in their litigation with the companies.

On April 29, the Florida Senate passed a different version of the bill, named the Florida Privacy Protection Act, which did not include a private right of action and provided for enforcement by the Florida Attorney General.  The bill was sent back to the House on April 30 but the House failed to take any action on it before the legislative session ended the same day.  It appears that the Senate’s most costly amendment to the original bill was the removal of the private right of action.

The bill’s sponsors, however, vowed to reconsider a privacy legislation next year. “We started an important conversation about data privacy for Floridians and took strong first steps toward common-sense changes,” said State Rep. Fiona McFarland, the House bill’s sponsor. “I look forward to continuing the good work on this complicated issue in the next session.”

Download Clarip’s U.S. Data Protection Laws 2020 – 2023 Datasheet for more on current and future United States consumer data protection regulations. Take a tour of Clarip’s patented data privacy technology and learn how Clarip can help your enterprise comply with emerging state level data subject rights regulations. Call Clarip today at 1-888-252-5653 or schedule a Demo Online!