Senate Bill 932 by state Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, on the collection of sexual orientation data; and SB 980 from state Sen. Tom Umberg, D-Santa Ana, on the privacy of consumers of genetic testing kits, have cleared the California State Assembly committees on Health, and Privacy and Consumer Protection respectively – their last hearings by policy committees. Those committees sent both bills to the Assembly Committee on Appropriations – which reviews all bills with fiscal impact. Among the takeaways:
• SB 932 would require electronic communicable-disease reporting tools used by the California Department of Public Health and local health officials be able to collect and report data relating to the sexual orientation and gender identity of people diagnosed with all communicable diseases. That’s a shift from its original focus on individuals diagnosed with COVID-19, Wiener told his Assembly colleagues, “because the state of California was not collecting any data around COVID’s impact on the LGBTQ community.”
“We’ve now expanded it to all reportable, communicable diseases. We are seeing what data shows us about the impacts of COVID in particular on communities of color, on older people, we need to have this data around the LGBTQ community,” he said Aug. 4. As an urgency statute, it would take effect immediately if passed by the Legislature and signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom.
• No witnesses opposed the bill and two spoke in favor. Rick Zbur, executive director of Equality California, told the committee that COVID-19’s impact on the LGBTQ+ community is still unknown. “We must never allow a vulnerable community like ours to be ignored or erased again. Because when LGBTQ people are left out of the data, we’re also left out of the data-driven response,” he said. Assembly members unanimously passed it out of committee, 15-0, but its next appearance is unclear.
• SB 980 would create the “Genetic Information Privacy Act” and prohibit “a direct-to-consumer genetic or illness testing services company from disclosing a person’s genetic information to a third party without obtaining the person’s prior written consent.” It would regulate COVID-19 testing companies not covered by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), and not allow them to share consumers’ biometric data without explicit consent; and would seek civil penalties for violations.
“We wanted to create a standard that protected consumers privacy, that they had to give an informed consent for uses of their genetic material, but one that wasn’t impossible for the conscientious direct-to-consumer businesses to be able to implement,” Umberg told Techwire.
• Committee members passed the bill as amended, with a stipulation that a company can market to consumers without express consent if the ad placement “is not intended to result in disparate exposure to advertising content” – a higher burden of proof than the original, Umberg said, which gives a company “some comfort that you’re not going to violate the law.” The bill also defines a “dark pattern” as a “user interface designed or manipulated with the substantial effect of subverting or impairing user autonomy, decision-making, or choice, as further defined by regulation.” That’s written to be consistent with the California Privacy Rights Act – the new initiative from San Francisco investor and developer Alastair Mactaggart, the force behind the California Consumer Privacy Act -- which has qualified for the Nov. 3 ballot. The Assembly Appropriations Committee is expected to announce a decision on the bill on Aug. 20, Umberg said.
