Exploring Financial Data Protection and Civil Liberties in an Evolved Digital Age

There is no comprehensive financial privacy law that can protect consumers from a company’s collection sharing and selling of consumer data. The most recent federal financial privacy law, the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (“GLBA”), was enacted by Congress over 20 years ago. Vast technological and financial changes have occurred since 1999, and financial privacy law is due for an upgrade. As a result, loopholes exist where companies can share financial data without being subject to laws or regulations. Additionally, federal financial privacy related laws provide little to no recourse for consumers to self-remediate with litigation, also known as a private right of action. This Comment explores the current regulations relating to consumer privacy, the protection of non-public consumer information, and the current issues associated with the consumer protection laws’ lack of private a right of action. This Comment investigates the policy implications of a private right of action for consumer financial privacy and suggests how future regulation or amendments to existing law protect consumers in the digital age. Finally, it explores potential policy solutions and posits that there can be a private right of action middle-ground