As Glenn Brown covers in greater detail here, as the trend of state laws granting more privacy and greater control over personal information continues in the US, the fate of privacy bills in Washington State, Oklahoma and Florida serve as a reminder that as with any other issue, political compromise is still a necessity in order for legislation to progress.  This is an update on our prior post published on April 5th, analyzing the chances that privacy bills introduced in Washington, Oklahoma, Florida and Connecticut will be enacted.

Notably, for the third year in a row, a comprehensive privacy bill titled the Washington Privacy Act found support in both legislative houses in Washington State, but failed to be reconciled with each other and were not enacted.  And Oklahoma’s privacy bill officially died when it failed to get passed out of the Senate Judiciary Committee by the legislative deadline for passing bills out of committee.  While the chances of a comprehensive privacy law passing in Florida remain strong, a Florida Senate committee recently amended its version of a privacy bill that the House is also considering, in order to lessen the burden on businesses.

Many more state privacy bills, including a bill in Connecticut, remain pending and have reasonable prospects of passing before the end of the states’ respective legislative sessions. We will continue to provide updates on these bills status changes in their respective legislatures.