On July 20, 2026, the California Court of Appeal, Fourth Appellate District issued a notable decision in Mata v. Digital Recognition Network, Inc.,[1] which addresses the standing requirements for private claims under California’s Automated License Plate Recognition (“ALPR”) law. At the heart of the decision lies the question whether a violation of the
Automated License Plate Reader (ALPR) technology is facing increasing legal scrutiny as courts, regulators and individuals attempt to examine and expose the various ways in which license plate data is captured, collected, shared and used. Recent disputes over ALPR technology have shifted away from issues of public safety and toward whether the private sector businesses and governmental organizations, among others, that utilize ALPR adequately disclose its use and sharing, as well as implement proper safeguards around this potentially sensitive, location-based personal information.
The private sector’s use of ALPR technology is facing challenges and possible legal exposure. In February of this year, California’s First Appellate District addressed the requirements imposed by the state’s ALPR Law in Bartholomew v. Parking Concepts, Inc., and in particular addressed what constitutes sufficient “harm” under the law to state a claim.1,2 In that matter, the plaintiff alleged that a parking garage owned and operated by Parking Concepts collected his license plate data without making a privacy policy regarding the collection publicly available. First, the Court determined that the parking garage camera system constituted a ALPR system under the law – that is, that it was “a searchable computerized database resulting from the operation of one or more mobile or fixed cameras combined with computer algorithms to read and convert images of registration plates and the characters they contain into computer-readable data.” But more importantly, the Court concluded that using ALPR technology without a publicly disclosed privacy policy stating when and how ALPR is collected and used violates an individual’s “right to know” of the activity, which is sufficient to allege harm under the law.
Continue Reading Automated License Plate Reader Technology Raises Concerns Over Private Sector Compliance and Government Overreach
Legal500 featured an article by Seyfarth partners Kathleen McConnell and Lauren Gregory Leipold, and associate Daniel Riley, “AI Governance In (and Beyond) Privacy: Regulatory Tensions in Automated Decision‑Making, the Digital Authenticity Crisis, and Restrictions on Professional Use.”
The piece, published as a part of the Legal500 Country Comparative Guides, examines the rapidly
When the California Privacy Protection Agency (“CalPrivacy”) announced a $1.35 million settlement in September 2025 – the largest CCPA penalty to date – one of the itemized grievances stood out for any practitioner who has wrestled with a vendor redline: the company had failed to amend or enter into third-party data protection vendor contracts by regulatory deadlines.
This hints at where state privacy enforcement is heading. The consumer-facing side of privacy compliance – notices, opt-out links, cookie banners – is visible and testable. But the back-end architecture of a compliant privacy program lives at least in part in vendor contracts, and regulators increasingly treat those contracts as evidence of program maturity (or its absence). Nowhere is this more concrete than in California’s 11 CCR § 7051.
Continue Reading The Paper Trail: State Privacy Law Contracting Requirements
As another piece of harmonization legislation, the AI Act is unsurprisingly reminiscent in regulatory philosophy to the GDPR. Many of the same data principles (transparency, accuracy, security) are present, as is an explicit risk-based approach. Understanding precisely where there is overlap with your existing GDPR program is a head start in your AI Act compliance program design. But it is also important to recognize where the two frameworks diverge. The GDPR regulates what happens to personal data, the legal basis for collection, how it is used, how long it is kept, who can access it. The AI Act generally regulates the AI system itself – namely, how it is designed, tested, documented, governed, and deployed. While that difference in regulatory object creates structural differences in inputs and outputs, the framework itself does have a lot of commonalities.
This post suggests a strategy for efficiently building a unified compliance framework for both regimes.
Continue Reading One Compliance Program for Two Frameworks: Aligning the EU AI Act and GDPR for EfficiencyEpisode 14 is now live. In this episode of Consumer Counterpoint, we sit down with Chicago partner Jay Carle to discuss the launch of Seyfarth’s new D.A.T.A. Law practice group. Jay shares insights into the group’s multidisciplinary approach and how it’s designed to help clients stay ahead of emerging data and technology challenges.
Robotics and artificial intelligence are converging at an unprecedented pace. As robotics systems increasingly integrate AI-driven decision-making, businesses are unlocking new efficiencies and capabilities across industries from manufacturing and logistics to healthcare and real estate.
Yet this convergence introduces complex legal and regulatory challenges. Companies deploying AI-enabled robotics must navigate issues related to data privacy, intellectual property, workplace safety, liability, and compliance with emerging AI governance frameworks.
Traditionally, robotics was viewed as a standalone discipline focused on mechanical automation. Today, robotics is increasingly powered by machine learning algorithms, natural language processing, and predictive analytics—hallmarks of AI technology.
This evolution raises critical questions for legal teams:
As robotics increasingly incorporates AI functionality, traditional contract structures for hardware procurement and service agreements require significant updates. This evolution introduces new risk categories that must be addressed through precise drafting and negotiation.
Continue Reading The AI-Driven Evolution of Robotics
On Friday, October 17, 2025, U.S. District Court Judge Vince Chhabria issued a biting Order granting defendant Eating Recovery Center, LLC’s (“ERC”) motion for summary judgment on the plaintiff Jane Doe’s California Invasion of Privacy Act (CIPA) claims, a law enacted in 1967 to address the increasing use of wiretapping to eavesdrop on private phone
On July 24, 2025, the California Privacy Protection Agency (“CPPA”) unanimously voted to adopt a package of Proposed Regulations for the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”), marking a significant development in California privacy law. These cover Automated Decision-making Technology (“ADMT”), mandatory Cybersecurity Audits, Risk Assessments, and clarifications for the CCPA’s applicability to Insurance Companies. The package will move into its final review stage before formal enactment, once filed with the California Office of Administrative Law.
This is a clear signal that privacy compliance expectations in California are trending toward a more operational phase. The new rules are designed to give Californians greater control over how their personal information is used while pushing businesses toward higher levels of transparency and accountability, especially when automated decision-making and high-risk data processing is involved. For companies, this is more than just a theoretical update – it’s a clarion call to ensure these requirements are built into day-to-day governance, technology and process design, and vendor management practices.
Continue Reading California Privacy Protection Agency (CPPA) Finally Voted to Adopt Much Debated Update to CCPA Regulations: What Your Business Should Know
On June 3, 2025, the California Senate unanimously passed Senate Bill 690 (SB 690), a bill that seeks to add a “commercial business purposes” exception to the California Invasion of Privacy Act (CIPA).
After multiple readings on the Senate floor, SB 690 passed as amended, and will now proceed to the California State Assembly. SB