While the European Union has implemented General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) requirements to protect privacy, we have yet to see much regulation from the United States. That’s set to change in 2021—both at the state level and likely the federal level, too.

First, the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) took effect January 1, 2020 and applies to all companies that do business in California and collect data on 50,000 people or more. The CCPA gives Californians the right to see, delete, and stop the sale of their personal information, according to the New York Times.

At the federal level, the United States Government has yet to pass a privacy law, but both parties in Congress and President Trump have stated publicly that they want a new federal law to protect people’s online privacy, according to another New York Times article.

There seems to be broad consensus that a national privacy law is needed. Washington Post reports that even executives at corporations like Apple and Google support a national consumer privacy law, although largely because they prefer a national privacy law over multiple state privacy laws. “If other states follow [California], we’ll be facing a patchwork of rules and fragmentation that will just be unworkable both for consumers as well as mobile companies and Internet companies,” said Leonard Cali, AT&T’s senior vice president for global public policy.

Consensus is rare in Washington, and it’s even rarer to have consensus with industry, also. The debate seems to be not whether there will be a privacy law, but about what the details will be. A US national privacy law appears likely in 2021.

To address this, we offer help for customers who want to prepare for the coming privacy regulations and protect their customers’ privacy.

Get started on your 2021 Privacy Roadmap.