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What an Employer May Screen in the Time of COVID-19 Posted on: March 19, 2020 In: Labor & Employment, COVID-19 Response
In this time of extra precautions, closing businesses, and social distancing, employers are doing their best to protect the public and their workers. Some businesses, however, are unable to close their doors and/or serve a valuable public purpose. For those employers, they seek any and all available methods to ensure safety. Some of those measures, however, may violate various laws, including the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the Rehabilitation Act.
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Tags:
eeoc, coronavirus, ada, reasonable accommodations, healthcare, covid-19
Inequitable Conduct or Experimentation: Long Live Inequitable Conduct? Posted on: March 17, 2020 In: Intellectual Property & Technology
The Federal Circuit recently found a litigant guilty of inequitable conduct in circumstances that should give pause to inventors who want to share their ideas for the purpose of experimentation before making a patent application.
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Tags:
uspto, patent law, patent application, experimentation, inventor
Washington State Data Breach Notification Statute Updates Go Into Effect, Imposing New Requirements on Businesses Posted on: March 17, 2020 In: Data Privacy & Cybersecurity
Effective March 1, 2020, amendments to the Washington State data breach notification statute made the law significantly more onerous for companies dealing with data security incidents. The amendments, which we first covered in May 2019, expanded the definition of personal information, shortened the deadlines for notification, and imposed additional requirements for notice contents.
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Tags:
washington, breach notification, data breach, consumer notification, personal data
ALERT: COVID-19 / Coronavirus-Related Ransomware and Phishing Attacks Posted on: March 13, 2020 In: Data Privacy & Cybersecurity, COVID-19 Response
With the advent of the Coronavirus, criminals have begun to take advantage of what consumers expect to receive via email to conduct phishing attacks. Criminals are also expected to take advantage of millions of vulnerable remote connections from employee home networks to their corporate networks.
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Tags:
phishing, covid19, coronavirus, cybersecurity, email
Colorado Temporarily Requires Employers to Provide Sick Leave While Awaiting COVID-19 Testing Posted on: March 12, 2020 In: Labor & Employment, COVID-19 Response
On March 11, 2020, the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment (CDLE) issued emergency rules, referred to as Colorado Health Emergency Leave with Pay (Colorado HELP) Rules, requiring employers in certain industries to provide four days of paid sick leave to employees with flu-like symptoms while awaiting test results for COVID-19.
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Tags:
coronavirus, covid-19, colorado, paid time off, sick leave, human resources
Ninth Circuit Holds Prior Salary Alone or in Combination with Other Factors Cannot Justify Gender Pay Gaps Under The Equal Pay Act Posted on: March 11, 2020 In: Labor & Employment
On February 27, 2020, the Ninth Circuit in Rizo v. Yovino held that an employer cannot rely on an individual’s prior salary alone or in combination with other job-related factors to justify a wage disparity between a male and female employee when defending against an Equal Pay Act (EPA) claim. The EPA prohibits employers from paying male and female employees differently for the same work, with a few exceptions, including when a pay difference is based on a “factor other than sex.”
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equal pay, equal pay act, 9th circuit, salary, sex discrimination
Ransomware and the Paramount Importance of Evidence Preservation for Healthcare Entities Posted on: March 10, 2020 In: Data Privacy & Cybersecurity
Organizations regulated by the Healthcare Information Privacy and Accountability Act (HIPAA) must take special care to preserve valuable forensic artifacts at the outset of a ransomware or other cybersecurity event. The HIPAA Breach Notification Rule presumes a cybersecurity incident has resulted in unauthorized access to unsecured protected health information and the burden shifts to the organization to show a low probability of the compromise of the health information it maintains.
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Tags:
ransomware, hipaa, hhsocr, personal data, data breach
Four Tips to Mitigate Employee Whistleblower Claims in Healthcare Posted on: March 05, 2020 In: Labor & Employment
Employees are an employer’s largest potential liability. This is especially true for employers in the healthcare industry who participate in federal healthcare programs. Federal law, and some states, allows employees to bring a civil lawsuit against employers for alleged violations of federal law. Whistleblowers are particularly active in healthcare. 86% ($1.909 billion) of all whistleblower recoveries were recovered in the healthcare space.
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Tags:
whistleblowers, healthcare, false claims act, compliance, federal law
CBD in the Workplace & Potential Changes to Kentucky Law Posted on: March 03, 2020 In: Labor & Employment
Compared to other states, marijuana laws in Kentucky are stringent, even for qualified medical patients. However, in 2017 the state’s legislature afforded statewide legal status for the consumption and retail sale of CBD products. Under state law, as long as CBD is derived from industrial hemp and less than 0.3% THC, it is legal to own CBD oil in Kentucky.
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Tags:
cbd, kentucky, drug testing, marijuana, human resources, employment law
Non-Compete Enforcement and “Hot Job Markets”: A Tale of Ten Cities Posted on: February 27, 2020 In: Labor & Employment
The Wall Street Journal recently published a list of the top ten “Hottest U.S. Job Markets” in 2019. Regions were evaluated based on unemployment, labor force, jobs and wages. What is compelling about this list (at least for your average trade secrets and non-compete attorney) is that it throws into doubt the popular argument that non-competes suppress wages and deter employee mobility.
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Tags:
non-competition, employers, trade secrets, employment law, employment agreements
HIPAA Small Breach Notification Deadline is March 1, 2020 – The Clock’s Ticking to Submit to HHS/OCR! Posted on: February 27, 2020 In: Data Privacy & Cybersecurity
Organizations that experienced a data incident in 2019 affecting the protected health information (PHI) of less than 500 individuals have just a few more days to submit their notification to the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights (HHS/OCR).
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Tags:
breach notification, data breach, personal information, hipaa, hhsocr
Illinois Court Expands Reach of the Defend Trade Secrets Act, Opening Door for Increased Damages Posted on: February 26, 2020 In: Labor & Employment
What is the geographical reach of the powerful trade secrets statute known as the Defend Trade Secrets Act, or DTSA? According to one judge in the Northern District of Illinois, the answer to this question is: the whole world!
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Tags:
trade secrets, dtsa, non-competition, eea, illinois