Small and Midsize Manufacturers Urged Lawmakers to Reform Flawed Illinois Law
SCHAUMBURG, IL – The Technology and Manufacturing Association (TMA) applauds Senate President Pro Tempore Bill Cunningham and the Illinois Senate for passing SB2979, an update to the Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA) that clarifies the law to reflect “per person” instead of “per occurrence” and makes the law retroactive to 2008 when the BIPA Act was written.
SB2979 fixes the current law to say that a company using biometric scanning for clocking-in purposes, for example, just needs to get permission from an employee once rather than every time an employee scans.
TMA is calling on the Illinois House to pass SB2979 so small and midsize manufacturers will no longer be threatened with annihilative lawsuits.
“We’ve had numerous talks with Senator Cunningham and other senators about why small and midsize manufacturers are threatened by BIPA lawsuits to the point where they could be forced to close their doors, and why clarification was needed in the current law,” said TMA Lobbyist David Curtin. “We made it clear that we agree we need laws in place that protect privacy and support a fair biometrics data privacy policy while at the same time not putting businesses in a position where they could be subject to annihilative lawsuits.”
“After making substantial progress with the Senate to make the law more effective, small and midsize manufacturers call on the Illinois House to pass SB2979 so this bill can be sent to the Governor’s desk and signed into law.”
TMA has been a leader on advocating for better BIPA legislation. Curtin offered supportive testimony of SB2979 in committee and his remarks can be found here.
About TMA: Founded in 1925, the Technology and Manufacturing Association is an independent trade organization exclusively focused on assisting small and midsize manufacturers by providing a diverse portfolio of benefits and services, including: community, information, training, resources, and advocacy. TMA has nearly 1,000 members representing over 35,000 manufacturing employees and more than 25 million square feet of manufacturing plant.
Other TMA News stories on the topic of the Biometric Information Privacy Act can be found here: https://tmanews.com/?s=BIPA
