WGBH: Mass. lawmakers push to secure residents’ data

“But advocates point to one provision in the House’s bill that they say is key: a ‘private right to action’ against the largest companies. That means, if companies that collect more than two million residents’ data every year and don’t obey the new limits, consumers in Massachusetts whose data has been illegally collected or sold can take the companies to court themselves.”

“’If the AG’s office takes on a case against Meta or Google, that’s those three attorneys — or whatever it is — in the privacy division’s life for seven years. They’re not going to have time to do anything else,’ said Caitriona Fitzgerald, deputy director at the Washington, D.C.–based Electronic Privacy Information Center, or EPIC, who supports the bill. ‘So that private right of action is really important both to ensure individuals can enforce their rights and also to kind of motivate that compliance by companies.'”

“The bill wouldn’t completely ban the sale of location data, just ‘precise’ data within 1,750 feet. 

“’Companies do not need to know our precise location in order to target us with ads. This bill still allows them to know that I’m in the Greater Boston area,’ Fitzgerald said. ‘This is protecting us from companies knowing exactly where we live, and that we drive to work every day.'”

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