The Federal Privacy Bill of Rights Act

The United States has yet to enact federal privacy legislation to regulate the use of personally identifiable information, in spite of a 15 year trend of a rising number of data breaches associated with the increasing value of such data. While Congress has struggled to agree on a number of proposals put forth in recent sessions, the European Union has enacted the GDPR to protect the privacy of European citizens. California has enacted the CCPA to protect residents of its state and many other states are in process of doing the same. The Privacy Bill of Rights would create a nationally recognized set of privacy rights for United States Consumers, protect them by recognizing a private right of action and empower enforcement through the establishment of an independent Federal Data Protection Agency. This independent analysis of the Privacy Bill of Rights will evaluate its ability to meet three goals 1. To provide consumers with clearly defined rights as to how their personally identifiable information is used and shared. 2. To provide added protections to consumers whose privacy rights are violated by businesses. 3. To reduce US business’s vulnerability to data breaches. The Privacy Bill of Rights may face political feasibility issues that will be further discussed. However, based on this analysis, the Privacy Bill of Rights would accomplish its goals and the recommendation is to pursue this bill