The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information (ONC) recently released an updated Guide to Privacy and Security of Electronic Health Information. The guide aims to help individuals, providers, and the health IT community understand the role of HIPAA for interoperability of health information.
This guide updates the previous version issued by the…
Last Tuesday, District Judge Lucy Koh of the Northern District of California partially granted the plaintiffs’ motion for class certification in In re Yahoo Mail Litig., allowing the plaintiffs to pursue their claims for injunctive relief on behalf of class members under the Stored Communications Act (“SCA”) and California’s Invasion of Privacy Act (“CIPA”). The plaintiffs, none of whom has a Yahoo email account, originally filed suit alleging that Yahoo scanned emails they exchanged with other individuals’ Yahoo email addresses and used the results for advertising purposes. Last August, Judge Koh partially granted Yahoo’s motion to dismiss, eliminating the plaintiff’s claims under the Wiretap Act and the California Constitution but allowing the SCA and CIPA claims to proceed.
After a brief one-week recess for Memorial Day, both chambers are back in town with a full agenda. The Senate returns to work on Sunday, May 31. Prior to breaking for Memorial Day, the Senate failed to bring to the Floor for consideration legislation to extend the surveillance authorities that are expiring on June 1. …
After six rounds of voting that saw off seven candidates from across the region, Nigeria’s outgoing Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Dr. Akinwumi Adesina has been elected to serve as the next president of the African Development Bank (AfDB).
From the start, Adesina was one of the leading contenders for the role. During…
May 29 marks the first deadline for the 2014 Benchmark Survey of U.S. Direct Investment Abroad (BE-10 survey). The BE-10 survey is conducted by the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Economic Analysis (“BEA”) under the authority of the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act. Through this survey and other surveys, BEA collects…
On 27 May 2015, the Italian Competition Authority (ICA) issued a decision launching a sector inquiry into the supply of vaccines for human use.
The ICA has stated that it has launched the sector inquiry because of:
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Earlier this week, the Department of Defense (“DoD”) issued a proposed rule to revise (and make stricter) the unique sourcing requirements applicable to certain photovoltaic devices that are used in the performance of DoD contracts. Specifically, unless an exception under the Trade Agreements Act applies or a contractor secures a waiver based on public interest…
A few weeks ago we posted about a new out-of-pocket limit for group health plans that provide family coverage. HHS announced that the ACA cost-sharing limit for self-only coverage applies to each individual who has family coverage. This embedded individual limit is in addition to the existing limit for family coverage, which applies to the aggregate costs of the covered individuals.
The Defense Contract Audit Agency (DCAA) recently issued its Fourth Annual Report to Congress dated March 25, 2015. Once again, the report shows DCAA is making modest improvements in the timeliness of its audits, and continues to seek regulatory changes that would provide DCAA greater access to contractors’ data, internal audits, and personnel.
Congress began requiring annual reports from DCAA in 2011 following well-documented and widely reported criticisms of DCAA that ranged from allegations about failure to comply with professional standards, questions about the timeliness of audit reports, and the well-publicized increased backlog of incurred cost proposals requiring audit. Section 805 of the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act requires DCAA to submit an annual report by March 30th of each year. Each report must provide statistics on DCAA’s audit performance during the previous fiscal year and address “Significant Deficiencies and Recommended Actions to Improve the Audit Process.”
The African continent is revolutionizing itself as the place where no infrastructure is no problem. This began in the telecommunications field: Africa lacks a robust system of landlines, which traditionally enable better access to desktop computers, online services, and financial institutions. But the emergence of cellular telephony has allowed individuals across Africa to bypass…
