Law Professor Solove Pushes for Duty of Care in Privacy Laws
The U.S. has entered a “golden age” of privacy regulation, but states are crafting ineffective laws that don’t fully protect consumers, George Washington University Law School professor Daniel Solove said Thursday at the Privacy + Security Summit.
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Solove said privacy regulation in the U.S. is focused on holding companies accountable when they fail to honor their terms of service. A better approach is to impose a duty of care on companies to give consumers confidence that they won’t be harmed when using the products in question. If a product harms consumers, the company must be held accountable, Solove argued.
Many legislators at the state and federal level have explored or included duty of care provisions in tech-related legislation. Colorado is considering removing duty of care from its comprehensive AI law (see 2505060033).
“I think the laws are going in the wrong direction, and I think they’re not effective,” he said. “Let’s pass laws that are going to actually work.” Many states are passing laws with the “same old tired formula with a slight mix-up that makes it a little different just to kind of be annoying but not really effective.”