NU Online News Service, Sept. 5, 11:47 a.m. – California's state legislative session ended on Aug. 31 with one major privacy bill being killed and another heading toward the governor's desk.
The highly controversial Senate Bill 773, a financial privacy bill sponsored by State Sen. Jackie Speier, D-San Mateo and Assemblyman Joe Nation, D-San Rafael, died in the final hours of the session. The bill's definition of an affiliate and the opt-out provision that it would require, concerned insurers. For companies considered non-affiliates, an opt-in would have been required.
In the final hours of the session, the senate refused to agree to changes made in the assembly and the assembly voted down the bill in a 36-34 vote. Forty-one votes were needed to pass the bill.
However, another privacy bill, Assembly Bill 2297, was passed by a vote of 47-28. That bill addresses privacy policies on Web sites. It requires privacy policies to be posted and requires that notification be given if there is a breach of security on a Web site and confidential consumer information is accessed.
