Committee approves updates to state data privacy, children’s online safety and consumer-protection measures

The General Law Committee on March 21 approved a multipart package of bills and amendments updating Connecticut’s data privacy and online-protection laws and adding new consumer-protection measures.

Key changes in the data privacy package include: lowering the company-size threshold for coverage, expanding the definition of sensitive data, excluding certain industry exemptions, and creating a registry for data brokers. The proposal would also add a new consumer right to see a list of companies to which a consumer’s data has been sold.

Representative Lamar, summarizing the package, said earlier exemptions had allowed some entities to avoid enforcement and that the attorney general’s enforcement report suggested updates were needed. The proposal reduces the compliance threshold from 100,000 to 35,000 residents for covered entities, with a zero…