Arnall Golden Gregory LLP is pleased to provide you with the Compliance News Flash. This weekly update is your source for timely background screening and immigration-related news that is important to your organization.

1. Massachusetts, Vermont, and Connecticut adopted salary history bans. Effective July 1, 2018 for Massachusetts and Vermont and January 1, 2019 for Connecticut, employers are prohibited from inquiring about an applicant’s current or past salary history. The goal of salary history bans is to reduce the pay gap between men and women for performing equal or comparable work. California, Delaware, Hawaii, Oregon, and major cities such as New York City have already enacted their own salary history bans. Maine, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island are considering similar legislation.
2. Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) enforcement is still a top priority for the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), according to the testimony of Maneesha Mithal, the Associate Director of the FTC Division of Privacy and Identity Protection. Associate Director Mithal testified before the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee on July 12th at a hearing on credit bureaus and the FCRA. The FTC has brought more than 30 enforcement actions for FCRA violations against consumer reporting agencies, users of consumer reports, and furnishers of information to consumer reporting agencies in the last ten years. Click here to read the FTC press release and here to read the text of Associate Director Mithal’s prepared statement. 
3. In an important case that ties the need for a plaintiff to show concrete injury under the FCRA (think Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit upheld an earlier dismissal of a case in which a job applicant filed suit against State Farm Insurance for allegedly relying upon credit report inaccuracies to deny the applicant a job. The Court found that the inaccuracies on the applicant’s credit report were not the reason that State Farm did not hire him. Because the credit report inaccuracies did not cause harm, the applicant’s rights under the FCRA were not violated. Click here to learn more about Dutta v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 9th Cir., No. 16-17216.
4. The European Union (EU) and Japan announced a data transfer deal to allow personal information to flow more easily between the EU and Japan. The agreement will lead to a mutual recognition of adequacy between the two sides with respect to safeguarding personal data and transfers of such for commercial purposes. The deal was announced in conjunction with a bilateral trade deal earlier this month. If approved internally, there will be a final deal in place later this year. Click here to read more.

5. Employers in San Francisco are now prohibited from asking prospective employees about arrest or conviction records on a job application. The amendments to the Fair Chance Ordinance (FCO) will take effect on October 1, 2018. The law will apply to employers that employ 5 or more persons, instead of the current number of employees which is 20. Employers will be prohibited from considering a conviction in the juvenile justice system, an offense other than a felony or misdemeanor (such as an infraction), a conviction that has been dismissed or expunged, or a conviction that is more than 7 years old. The changes to the FCO also increase the penalties and provide for a private right of action by employees and applicants. Click here for more details about San Francisco’s FCO.