The Data Diva E209 - Monique Priestley and Debbie Reynolds

Debbie Reynolds, “The Data Diva” talks to Monique Priestley, State of Vermont House of Representatives (Privacy Advocate). We discuss Monique’s involvement in Vermont privacy bills and advocacy efforts, emphasizing the significance of the bill and the need for continued advocacy in the privacy space. Monique details the arduous journey of the Kids Code and Data Privacy bill through the State Senate, citing industry pressure and last-minute negotiations that led to unexpected changes in the bill's version. We talk about the complexities of regulation, focusing on the challenges faced at the U/S. State and federal levels.

We also discuss the shifting dynamics of consumer privacy and the impact of lobbying efforts on legislative measures to safeguard consumer rights. We emphasize the critical need for raising public awareness and providing education on data privacy issues, expressing concerns about the dissemination of misinformation and fear-mongering tactics used by lobbyists to thwart consumer protection bills. Monique stresses the significance of having industry experts testify and provides assistance in countering arguments and misinformation related to policy issues.

The conversation also touches on the pressing need for stronger privacy legislation at both state and federal levels, particularly in response to recent data breaches affecting a large number of Americans. We express concerns about the challenges of managing privacy issues on a state level and the potential impact of a weak federal law on consumer protection. Additionally, we emphasize the importance of creating solutions for individuals affected by data breaches and the need for broader education on privacy issues. We also explore the intricate relationship between AI legislation and data privacy, underscoring the crucial need for data protection regulations as a foundational step before enacting AI bills.

Monique stresses the significance of public awareness, data minimization, and the protection of both consumers and businesses, expressing the need for storytelling testimony to support their cause. We touch upon developing a playbook to assist other U.S. states in implementing similar protections and the collaborative efforts with advocacy groups and other states to advance their cause. The conversation also highlights the potential impact of their efforts on a state-by-state basis, the intention to create a playbook detailing the legislative process and common amendment requests, and her hope for Data Privacy in the future.

Transcript

E209---Monique-Priestley

46:48

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

data privacy, Vermont legislation, consumer protection, data minimization, private right of action, industry lobbying, misinformation campaigns, public awareness, compliance training, data breaches, AI legislation, federal law concerns, state coordination, advocacy efforts, legislative process

SPEAKERS

Debbie Reynolds, Monique Priestley

Debbie Reynolds  00:00

Debbie, the personal views expressed by our podcast guests are their own and are not legal advice or official statements by their organizations. Hello, my name is Debbie Reynolds. They call me the data diva. This is the data diva talks privacy podcast where we discuss data privacy issues with industry leaders around the world with information that businesses need to know. Now, I have a very special guest on the show, Monique Priestley. She is the state representative for the state, the great state of Vermont.

Monique Priestley  00:32

Welcome, awesome. Thanks, Debbie, thanks for having me. Well,

Debbie Reynolds  00:36

it's great to have you on the show. I'm excited to talk with you. You and I have got to know each other on LinkedIn. We actually were involved some shenanigans together, but we could talk a little bit about about some of the stuff that's happening in Vermont on privacy, but I want to talk. I want you to tell a little bit about your journey and your work and your state representativeship in the state of Vermont and how that relates, or how you got a passion for privacy.

Monique Priestley  01:05

Thanks for having me. I've been fangirling your podcast through LinkedIn and all your updates. So it's awesome to be here. When I was younger, I start, I was just had a I love of tech in general. So I, you know, some of my earliest jobs were doing like network administration, my first kind of real Job Internship, things were doing like data entry for, actually, I haven't talked about this on podcasts yet, but it was doing like data entry for, like a printing press company. And I quickly realized that it was very boring, and I wanted to try to come up with formulas to fill in all the database stuff very quickly, so I didn't have to sit there doing line by line, so the network administration hardware side, and then kind of the database software side, that progressed to like web design, and then eventually to an edtech software company in Seattle for 14 years, where I did everything from like Web Design to cross kind of like payment processor and integrations to like integrations with customer relationship management systems and all kinds of stuff and implementation of onboarding customers. So all along the way, it was a lot of like trying to make tech friendly and understandable for people, while also having a love of what it could do. My career side of things was tech, and then my kind of the rest of my time was spent at nonprofits, on boards and volunteering, and I turned a department store into a co working space, and so that that was kind of like with all of my board service locally. And that's I was kind of like a go to for, you know, people would randomly walk in and say, like, can you help me find a job? Or, I need, I want to start a business. Can you help me? Or, you know, any number of things that made it kind of natural that when our state rep for our region ran for Secretary of State, she basically said, like, all right, you're up. And so ended up in the building. Really going on commerce. Asked for commerce because of my economic development nonprofit kind of experience background. And then was kind of pleasantly surprised when we started taking up consumer protection bills, which were not something that I realized we were going to get to do. So the first time that we took up kind of a FinTech like payday loan type bill that was fascinating for me. And then the next kind of bill we took up was data privacy in 2023

Debbie Reynolds  03:26

Well, I know Vermont is interesting from a data privacy point of view, because you were the first state to have a Data Broker law, yes, which I think is really interesting. Let's talk about this. This thing that happened this year Vermont with your privacy bills, pretty interesting. First of all, it, the bill was very good, and I think a lot of people who read it, privacy folks like me read it, we thought, okay, well, this is really sophisticated, you know, it, it really talked about, you know, the gaps and cracks, or privacy in a way that some of the other bills had not. And so we were really excited about it. But, you know, there are some some shenanigans that happen here, indeed, Vermont. And the funny thing is, so you, because you and I are connected on LinkedIn, you are saying, Oh, no, what was happening? And one of my colleagues sent me a a article about the Vermont deal, and I saw you quoted it in it, and I was like, and they were talking about all the challenges that were happening. And then I called you, and then you told me about it, and I was like, what? So we mobilized some people. We got some letters out, and, you know, did some we were doing some weekend work together, trying to get some advocacy up, which definitely helped. But tell, tell me about that story.

Monique Priestley  04:43

So much. Yeah, so So at the end of 2023 we, we had spent, like all of 2023 on, like most of it on data privacy, an initial draft, and decided not to move forward with it. And so that was my first year of my this is my first. So it was my first year, and so I basically expressed that I would love to keep working on it throughout the summer. And so at the same time that kind of the vice chair, Stephanie Jerome, rep, Stephanie Jerome, and and I were kind of like starting to work on it. And then at some point, I really dove into it and just started, you know, I reached out to Senator James Maroney from Connecticut, because our chair wanted to use that as the base for our work in 2024 and so I really asked, like, you know, what did you do in this bill? What did you wish that you could do? You know, what's, what's some advice you have for me if I'm going to run with this? Who can you like? And then he just started connecting me with lots of folks who he had worked with that were advising him and working on the bill and advocates, and then also industry folks. And so that is so it started kind of there, and definitely started talking to other state reps and senators from across the country, AGS offices, but then also a wide range of advocates and law professors and industry folks. So when we got into the building, we had a draft that had been group work collaboration from across the country in so many different ways. And actually I even went visited a friend in the EU who is on the team that works on on privacy there. Then it was kind of introducing it. And then, you know, all of the lobbying, you know, initially started happening for us. So it was like getting people on the testimony list. This was new for me. So so much of the kind of the pageantry, piece of doing testimony, I was learning, so in the early stages of this, I didn't catch on immediately to what the problem, what that process is, and there was at some point. So there's a lot of work that I was doing outside of committee, like hundreds of hours with different people at all times a day. I mean, at some point my chair was like, we need to, you need to start having these key conversations on the record, just having them over again, because that's the process. You have to get it in the public. So then I it clicked for me at that point, when we were talking through it. So that's that, that point we started figuring out, you know, the lineup of testimony. And I would say, as far as lobbying goes, like lobbyists would try, you know, from everywhere. So it would be like sbsc and all the big on CCIA and like all the ones you see, but then also like our local lobbyists for Google and Amazon and meta and the car industry associations and data brokers and insurance companies and the banks and the healthcare industry and the utility companies and you, you figure out what data, what is using data, and then they work here so, and they were, you know, initially trying to, like, kind of work through other committee members and other members of the House. And I have a really, you know, I feel like the relationship between me and and my chair and vice chair and the speaker and stuff is, is really solid. I guess that kind of Lent to one. I was like, building trust with everybody. So we started funneling all everybody. Everybody started redirecting all of the lobbyists that they could basically through me. So people started declining conversations and said, like, you gotta go talk to Representative Priestley. And then I had a series of questions that was that I would run through every kind of by every lobbyist. And I, I, I would take a meeting with any lobbyist and any client who asked for it like I wanted to have those conversations across the board and the advocates. And so anybody who wanted to talk about the bill, I wanted to sit down with them. And it was fascinating to, like, hear the questions and hear the arguments, see who was coming in kind of like good faith, see who was stonewalling. There was a whole range of things. But yeah, I guess that's I'll stop there, unless you want me to keep going on, like, where it ended up. I guess I could fast forward. Yeah, go ahead. Let's fast forward. Okay, so all that's happening so, like, three weeks before it leaves, our house committee unanimously, the lobbyist basically said, like, we give up on you guys. We'll see in the Senate. And so there was originally an agreement with the Senate that we were they were giving us kids code, so the age appropriate design code, we were giving them data privacy. Things were supposed to go smoothly and pass it to both bodies after the due process. And that immediately did not happen. So lobbyists were definitely hard on a Senate side, and also, I've since talked to a lot of local lobbyists that are smaller, like they have smaller clients, and they're like, We didn't realize what was even happening until it hit the Senate, like we weren't aware that the data privacy Bill was happening, which was fascinating, because in the national press that was blowing up with the five legislator hearing that we had. We were sharing the war stories of lobbying efforts and yeah, so in the Senate, it got hit hard. Basically it turned into, like the Senate Bill, turned into a super watered down industry bill. So then when things volley back and forth to like, the House and the Senate. So basically it would, you know, would come back to us and we'd make it, we'd swap it in our version, and then they'd swap in their version that we swapped in our version at the last kind of, like, minutes final, I guess, the last weekend before things were versions were going back and forth. I spent three full days with our legislative council to try to do what was like as best faith as we could, conference compromise, basically, and so all to harmonize. At that point, we had stuck the kids code and the data privacy bill together because there was a lot of politics around our 121, data privacy act being sat on so that there wasn't so we they would run out the clock, basically, but they wanted kids code to pass, and I knew that, so we basically smushed them together, and then we had to harmonize them. And so kind of like final hours the night before it came down to a vote, my chair called, and was like, they want to they want to negotiate. And I was like, what? And it was really just around the private right of action, and it was not actually that significant, as far as I was concerned, sort of like do it, but then the next thing we know, everything's everybody's freaking out because they made the changes to their version industry version of the bill, not the agreed upon house version of the bill. So There ended up being some cloro negotiations. There ended up being some last minute utility companies, healthcare companies, kind of freaking out over trying to get exemptions adjusted. It passed. It passed out of the Senate on a voice vote after having passed out of the entire House unanimously, 139 to zero. Then, kind of like fast forward, it went to the governor. It got vetoed, then the house came back and overrode it, still with a very strong vote, the strongest override vote, and then the Senate fixed or seven senators basically got flipped by lobbying efforts, and they voted against the bill so it did not get over it in the Senate, they actually people called me the night before that vote and said, If you take out The private right of action, we'll flip them all back on you. And you said we're not doing it. So, so it failed, yeah?

Debbie Reynolds  12:07

I think it by one vote, right?

Monique Priestley  12:09

Actually, it's two thirds, so it was six votes short. Yeah, it

Debbie Reynolds  12:14

was a valiant effort. And I think as I was seeing this play out, especially on our weekend, and you and I were talking, I think people don't really realize, you know, this is an international show. People don't really realize, like, all the stuff that happens to be able to get bills to be passed into law. So all of us are, for example, we're in awe what the EU is doing with their regulation when it's like, yeah, for us, it's like a inch by inch, turf by turf, state by state. Battle, truly, what are your thoughts? Yeah,

Monique Priestley  12:46

yeah. I mean that that is so interesting to me. And I find it interesting, like, so I'm learning all of this stuff as I go. And so, you know, at the beginning, it definitely felt like federal bill made the most sense. We also understood that, like, states need to make incremental change to try to help push that at this point, like, watching the whole APRA process and having seen the state process, I'm like, terrified of having a watered down federal bill pass and then preempt everybody. So I don't know that it's like that if we're gonna have a week built so that that was fascinating to watch. And the thing that's interesting for me in Vermont is like, I definitely anticipated lobbying. I did not anticipate the amount I was millions of dollars spent and so many lobbyists and so much misinformation campaigns. I mean, that was it was good. We know what the other tactics are but, but for us in Vermont, we're like, so small so to watch that amount of force being spent here, I can't even imagine what other states are like facing when they're trying to do work, and then the federal piece like that has got, like, I was, you know, at the point where things were really blowing up in The Press, like, I had a lot of relationships, like, solid relationships with reporters, which was awesome, and watchdog organizations that were then an advocacy organizations that were, like, on the ground, watching the federal stuff, and then, like, sharing what they were seeing with me, as far as what entities were showing up, seeing what kind of correlation there was between the state and federal levels, which there's a lot out of. The whole entire thing terrifies me. And I'm so curious what happens in the EU and like other countries and other places like just regionally, this fight must change a bit, but it must also be very much the same.

Debbie Reynolds  14:38

Well, I know that the year ripping and ready to go for the next round about you know, I have my own run ins with lobbyists, very interesting, their their playbook, but I think I don't know. I think things are changing a bit, and I think part of that, I don't want your thoughts. I think part of that is some of the more recent. Developments around everyone's social security number in the US got breached, and it's like, Why do these people have our data, right? Did I give them their data? Like, are they authorized to have my data, or do they have what it takes to protect the information that they have? So I think there are going to be a lot more questions from the public, because I think the problem that happens, especially with consumers, is that a lot of these things are very reactive, where you're like, Okay, if someone reached your data, then you, you know, file a court case, or you have to go to get credit monitoring or different things like that. But I feel like a lot of the work and the burden are on consumers. But what are your What are your thoughts? No,

Monique Priestley  15:42

for sure, and actually, I mean, that's that is kind of the biggest realization from this whole bill is one again, like even as a consumer, I was learning things that I didn't realize. The storytelling aspect, I guess we're so bad at in legislature in general, and even in parties, the more I started telling friends about examples like, Have you got a USPS text where it's like, they're trying to get you to go pay for something you never ordered? Like things like that is like, your data with sold, and they're like, buying it. And then they're giving you these text messages, like little basic things. And then they started picking up on things like going to hotels and needing to scan their face to get into their room, or going to their a car dealer and buying, buying a car, and then asking about privacy out of curiosity, and then finding that so they were opted in, and unless they refused. So the awareness piece for sure, I feel like, in a bubble on LinkedIn and the legislature like paying attention to these articles. I'm worried that, like, I don't know how much the general public is paying attention, I hope it is, but that was one of the biggest lessons for sure. I guess kind of two for me is that the public, you know, there's millions of dollars from national and maybe international lobbying efforts that are in this building fighting this bill to protecting consumers, and consumers don't have a lobbyist in the building, protecting them, fighting for them. So that just feels gross. So there's some things there I'm trying to work on with others, and then also, like the misinformation scaring especially using small businesses as pawns to basically scare them into you know, this bill is going to drive them out of business. So working with a number of people have met on LinkedIn to do some compliance workshops and to run people through compliance training for free, so they understand that they're actually at more risk not having this as a business owner and not realizing what they're doing with their data than they are if they complied and were paying attention to what they're using for third parties and ad trackers and all that kind of stuff. So yeah, it's 100% major consumer education effort. For sure.

Debbie Reynolds  17:54

I agree, and I saw some of those letters that came out to these different trade groups, and trade associations saying, hey, oh, you're going to go out of business because you're going to get sued and stuff like that, which is the basic fear mongering that you hear that gets chopped around every state, basically hoping that in the future that more of that awareness is happening, especially I'm seeing people's eyes be being open, especially they have to fend for themselves right where their their data is being sold and they don't they don't know how these people know this information and it's being used for nefarious purposes.

Monique Priestley  18:33

And also people. I also hope that people are paying attention to who is leading them and who is representing them, whether it was like roll senators to roll due to lobbyist pressures, or like our own governor's office told us that between the veto and the override, that there were 200 businesses that said that they that he should veto the bill, and there was nothing in support of it. And then a reporter FOIA the governor, and that was not true. I think it was 88 that were asking him to sign the bill, and there were 83 asking him to veto it. And that didn't even include the kind of the advocacy emails that, like Consumer Reports and and those types of you know, vprg had had prompted. So there's also just like, Miss information from our leadership, which is, you know, whether or not that veto and the Senate overhead was in the best interest of Vermonters and and really not just bowing down to lobbyist pressures, which is, which is really unfortunate and sad that we're the only first and only state that has actually had a governor that vetoed A private consumer protection Privacy Bill. So, yeah,

Debbie Reynolds  19:41

yeah. Who came out and support the big advocacy groups that you can name that support it?

Monique Priestley  19:47

Yeah, and they actually signed on to a letter to that I ended up putting on LinkedIn, but it was like, I'm gonna forget all the names. But in general, Consumer Reports, big one, and then like, Center for Democracy, technology. Technology, epic, the US, PIRG, our local so Public Interest Research Group, our local one. There was some smaller, kind of like business organizations that represents, like minorities and women, things like that. But yeah, I would say Consumer Reports and epic and PIRG have been the kind of like big champions for US national.

Debbie Reynolds  20:23

So I don't want to give away your playbook for for the next round. But What? What? What help you know, because we have opportunities to talk to such a large audience. What do you need from us?

Monique Priestley  20:36

Yeah, so I mean, that's awesome, and people have been awesome. I would say one like, if people are listening to this and they want to help, like, please do not hesitate to reach out on on LinkedIn, or I have a website that's unconnected to an email. It's just lipstickpolicy.com but what's really helpful for me is one like, I've just been reading every article that people are sharing on LinkedIn and stuff. So that's great. But also, like, as far as I need people to testify, so I've been talking to like, even, like, industry specific kind of folks, you know, like privacy for car scheme for instance, like, I watch Andre's like LinkedIn and see all the like information that he's sharing there. And so we've been talking about, like, you know, when the when the audio auto Alliance comes in. I also want to be able to have, like, industry specific experts who have been at the federal level, who know exactly what the arguments are. And so there's, you know, anytime that I'm going into, for instance, like I went to a legislative summit and talk to a lot of industry folks and but I did prep calls with a lot of privacy folks, and I'm like, Give me, give me the bingo card of the things that are going to be said to me, the arguments that are going to come up, and then I need the counters. And so even just doing some study sessions with me, or anybody who's willing to talk to me and educate me has been really helpful on specific things. But yeah, people to testify, people to help, kind of like, with just counter the arguments. I think this year the arguments are going to come harder and faster and like, what we what I was doing, which is unusual. So much of this was unusual for our building in general, is that when we, kind of like the trade groups, would send out emails to their customers, their customers would be friends of mine, and they would forward their emails to me. And then I would go, kind of like, argument by argument, misinformation by misinformation, and robust those. And I would work with, like a series of law professors, tech industry folks, whatever, who are willing to help to say, like to counter those. And then I would send them to every single person, every single legislator in the building. And so that was really helpful. I think those types of emails are, like, I said, are going to come harder and faster. And so anybody who's willing to, who has a background in this, that's willing to do, like, quick, like, sometimes it would be like, I need to text somebody, or I need to have a phone call with somebody that say, like, they're saying this, what do I say back? And sometimes that's a pretty fast process. And then I have folks that are helping with the small business and nonprofit compliance training to try to get some businesses up to speed with complying with the law, to show that it's, like, safe and like, affordable before we even pass it, so they can come and testify in support of it. So yeah, really, just anybody who has an interest in helping with this, I we're look, taking a close look at exemptions. We're doing some studies on sector specific exemptions. And then also, I want to get creative with enforcement. So anybody who wants to, like, brainstorm around those types of things. But really, anybody who's reached out has been amazing. And also I've linked, I've reached out to lots of people, like Michael Clark, that was just on your podcast. I liked them, and I was like, That was fascinating. Can you please talk? So I'm also just kind of like following everybody's articles and and reaching out and just asking people for a conversation. So I super appreciate all of the time that everybody has given so far on this from around the world, really, you're

Debbie Reynolds  24:06

doing a great job. You're doing a great job reaching out and doing the advocacy, and you're right. You know, really having that ground game and having those people that you can reach out to quickly and get answers, I think that's really helpful. I actually had a had a experience with one of the auto lobbying groups. I'm on an IoT advisory board, and of the hundreds of recommendations that that were made in a report, only one lobbyist groups was upset with one of my recommendations, which is around auto stickers and privacy information, as you said, they kind of came in, like just out of nowhere, and really swift with all these arguments. But I had been watching these same groups make these same arguments, state by state or whatever, so I kind of knew what they were trying to do, and I knew that they didn't know me, so I lit them up on. On the federal record, and anyone who wants to listen to that conversation, they definitely can, and they did not prevail, but, but, yeah, we'll be there for you, whatever you need, whatever you need, whatever information that you need. I think it's really important, because it's hard to play play defense. So I think we really have, yeah, play offense or really plant those seeds so people really understand, and I think some of the the bad press that we're seeing around people's data being misused, and data breaches, especially, though, is especially the one about everyone you know, potentially everyone who has their social security numbers breach, right? You know, I think those things were really hit close to home. It's like, okay, we had better rules around how people can handle people's data. You know, this would greatly reduce that, that type of thing, because I think it's going to be a pain for for people to try to figure out how to protect themselves without some help, right? Because I think, unfortunately, so many of these regulations are very pro business, which, you know, there's nothing wrong with business. You don't want to put people out of business, but so few really help the consumer in a way that that is not reactive, right? Because not everyone can file a suit or have have millions of dollars to go through legislation or litigation to try to get, you know, a six hour check for the class action or something like that, where what they really want is just to not have to have those issues in the first place. And

Monique Priestley  26:32

I think for me, definitely do not want to, like, hurt small businesses. What's what's funny for me with the arguments of, like, are you trying to kill small businesses, like at my coworking space, like I teach small business planning classes, and I own a nonprofit, and I've been there, and so, you know, it's really important for me. I think even just like civics education, where we need to actually give people full information, we need to be transparent with them. We don't need to be fear mongering and or holding information from them. And, you know, just even having a few conversations with local lobbyists who wanted good faith, like my clients are scared. What do I tell them? And like I would sit down with their clients, and like a lot of it was just like they just even basic questions you if you're a nonprofit or something or a small retailer, you're probably not holding most of your data on, like a spreadsheet on your computer. It is going into some other system, like HubSpot or Salesforce or little green light or whatever it is. And so it just having conversations of like, how many of those software applications are you using? Who built your website? Like, do you track? What's going on with your like marketing, just like, super basic questions where most of the answers is like, Oh no. I never thought about how many like software programs I'm using, or like where that information is going, and whether I'm not putting up people at risk. I think, I think the more the businesses think through what this actually means, like, they want to be responsible, responsible, and it's really the huge, massive corporations that were, you know, that are taking advantage of them, basically, and then taking advantage of consumers.

Debbie Reynolds  28:08

What do you think has been one of the most effective lines of attack that you received, that that it was hard to kind of overcome with, you know, legislators or consumers about about this, like maybe misinformation that was given that was hard to counter.

Monique Priestley  28:26

So the one is it the misinformation itself, but how it was given? And I had my assumptions that it was a lot of like one single person and or entity that was feeding talking points to everyone else, and I've since had that confirmed in a number of different conversations and ways. But that was the biggest thing, is that you'd have one big, one person entity representing all of the major ones and all the smaller ones, getting the local trade associations. We don't have time. They don't have knowledge in this space. They're trying to track five different bills that are massive, like housing and things like that. And so they are very reliant on these people who say that they're experts. So they're getting talking points. And the hardest thing and was that they were just regurgitating these talking points and then sending them out in all of their email newsletters to all of their customers. So it's like hundreds of businesses across the state, which they're then scaring and like some of the folks who were the loudest voices that came in here have since admitted to, like our ag, that they never read the bill. I don't think most people read the bill that were coming in to testify, and, like even the big, kind of big corporations that were writing veto letters. I heard from advocates that they like wrote to them being like, obviously didn't read the bill. This is not what the bill does. Like, please do your work better. So it's just that it's like a willful ignorance and then using misinformation without even. Reading it, then that's spreading like wildfire down, trickling down through people who don't have time to know any better and don't have the resources to find out, and even talking to local lobbyists who have massive clients, they're like, I'm not a lawyer, and my major corporation I'm representing has a whole team of lawyers that I have to run everything by. It sometimes takes five weeks for them to get back to me, and then they might tell me three different things. So when I'm trying to have a good faith argument with them on the ground, they don't actually know how to do that because I'm not having a direct conversation with, say, Google or the work this summer has been trying to, like, make more direct connections. Um, so don't have to go through five levels of it sucks for both the lobbyists and for us to have to go through multiple channels with things, with telephone, a game of telephone, basically,

Debbie Reynolds  30:52

oh, my goodness. Well, we're ready. So whatever you need from us, for me, or else happy to fly to Vermont and chat. You

Monique Priestley  31:00

can do a zoom, you can do zoom? Yeah, everybody can testify over zoom. That'd

Debbie Reynolds  31:04

be great to do it, happy to do it. What? What's happening in the world right now that you're thinking about that's concerning you in privacy, or whether it's legislation, or whatever's happening in the US?

Monique Priestley  31:16

Yeah, I mean, I think the bigger thing for me is that, like, especially with this wave like, you know, there's multiple states that we want to do the artificial intelligence legislation together, and we Vermont and like needs to catch up, and other states need to catch up as far as having a privacy basis. So that kind of mismatch, for me is a little concerning. But like, nationally, I think states are talking more to each other. I definitely know, you know, 20 or so states that are talking about doing things together, coordinating, which is really exciting in a way that I don't think it's happened before. So I think the states that have passed bills that they weren't comfortable with want to make some in some cases, they want to make them stronger, and I hope they can. And so that is hopeful for me. I just feel like we are. We're so far behind. This should have been 20 years ago. There's also, I think, actually, something to point out that we saw in Vermont is that all of our consumer protection bills, like our major ones, like I ran right to repair the first year, and both right to repair and data privacy had industry coming and in undermining our Consumer Protection Act from the 60s and trying to separate any access to private right of action which is built in, it's baked into our Consumer Protection Act at a fundamental level, so that trying to undermine general consumer protections for Americans is at the root level, is very that's horrifying. And I don't know how many other states that's happening in, so that's something I'm just curious. I'm I'm really curious about going more to the roots, like even what Texas was in the articles about Texas with their GM lawsuit and the deceptive like the unfair and deceptive protections. So I guess from, from my point, I'm like, I'm interested at a research level of, like, what goes into all of these when we're not scrambling to just copy each other, which is what's happening, and what happens if we if we pause, but not too long, to actually figure out what we're what we're kind of doing across states. Yeah,

Debbie Reynolds  33:23

and let's talk about the federal bill, federal law. So I think I share your concern. A lot of us are concerned that there'll be, like, a federal law that will be super weak and super watered down, and it'll create a ceiling, as opposed to a floor with with consumer protection, but, but what? What are your thoughts there?

Monique Priestley  33:44

No, I mean, it's just that. And when people were people towards the end, were like, Oh, why are you wasting your time? There's going to be a federal law soon, and cramped everything you do. And one, I was like, Okay, well, Congress is a mess, so I don't know that I'm going to put my my money there. But then, yeah, watching the process and like having even watching, just like the LinkedIn updates from the folks from aipp and things like that, where it just and hearing from reporters who were in the room and things like that, where it was like the same tactics and the same group showing up to influence the federal level as had come here, and it's so so blatantly obvious, the same playbook and the same arguments and the same profit and power that they stand to lose, and that I feel like as a country, we have lost our way there, and I'm not sure How we rolled that back. Yeah, yeah,

Debbie Reynolds  34:41

yeah. I'm concerned too. I mean, I'm I hate to keep bringing it back to this data breach. About like almost all Americans, no social security numbers may have been in this breach. And so when I see something like that, that's a that's something that impacts the whole country. Okay, right? So you can't really manage it on a state level. How do you even address that on a state level?

Monique Priestley  35:09

And I think the thing there that we can do that in the absence of like, federal pieces having recourse for people to be able like, if we have state solutions for people, people to be able to like, seek, you know, to get that, to get whatever it is that's stolen back and the harms that were created and that kind of stuff. So I know, like, I would hope at the state level, that we can work faster to create solutions for people to have access to if they do like, if their Social Security is then used for identity theft and things like that. So I do think that we need to keep going on the state level, if for no other reason, to try to get other states to tighten up their thing and have a wave that makes a stronger federal law when it does pass. But yeah, we are this data breach, and then the subsequent ones that keep popping up on LinkedIn or that's horrifying. And even just talking to like, my friends are trying to see my Facebook, you know, posts about this or whatever. And what do we even do? And I'm like, Well, you freeze your credit, I guess, to start, but I don't, I don't know. We don't know what the ramifications of this are going to be. Yeah,

Debbie Reynolds  36:20

there are no no good answers. No good yes, for that, for me, I my in the future, I would like to see there be less data, less data sharing, or less need to share data, and then that the data stays with those approved sources that know how to protect it, as opposed to, right now. It's just kind of very wild west.

Monique Priestley  36:43

Yeah, I was in this boat as well, as far as, like, you know, a couple years ago, having been like, conversation my uncle, where he's, like, very at the time, I thought privacy paranoid, and now I'm like, he's not very privacy paranoid at all. It's very just realistic. And I was like, Oh, well, I use, like, social media and like, but I'd say I'm getting something out of it. And so I'm like, trading now. I'm like, I don't want to be on anything anymore, and but you have to be because you have like, in order to keep up with people and run businesses and things like that. Like that is where customers are. So it's a, it's a super catch 22 but, yeah, I don't know. I think I'm hoping that we can have broader education again so everybody realizes that they don't have to sacrifice who they are. They shouldn't have to sacrifice their identity to be able to like use the internet. Yeah.

Debbie Reynolds  37:34

What would your thoughts about AI and privacy and on the legislative level? As you know, many of us have been pushing for privacy regulation or legislation for a long time when AI became more democratized. I guess it's like all the people have been talking about and the news that and we see states trying to do AI legislation, like, how does that does that help privacy? Does it hurt privacy? Doesn't interfere. What's your thought?

Monique Priestley  38:02

I think we have established. What I was trying to push for sure is that we can't do AI bills until we have a data privacy bill, because the AI is using our data in order to feed them like algorithm stuff. So I think that got across. So I think I think there is a certain level, I think it does help that the more people are freaked out about AI, they do, I think at a fundamental level, realize we need data protections to help what it is feeding off of in order to do those harms. I It's both the data privacy bill and the AI bills. I had three different artificial intelligence bills that a kind of a copy of Maroney SB two, an early draft of it. And then I had a liability bill, a generative a liability bill that center Freeman technology basically drafted. And then I had an automated decision employee monitoring and automated decision making bill. And the stories around those, I feel like that actually is maybe something that is can help the conversation is that the storytelling around AI in order to get people sold on it, but also to scare people, is really good. There's so many stories in a way that I think it's harder to tell stories about data use. So I think that that helps people are freaked out about how AI can use data to do things, but, yeah, it's at the same time, though, like, I'm so curious, you know, talking to Senator Rodriguez and Moroni, like it sounded like the AI fight, lobbying fight was 10 times harder than the data privacy fight, so I don't know what that means for us. You know, we're gonna try to basically get data privacy introduced early and then, and then really run with a multi state AI bill. And so I don't know what that looks like this year, it's going to be a another war on all fronts. I think, yeah,

Debbie Reynolds  39:54

I think so too many of us have been working in the data space. We all you know, when we saw people get. Get really excited and want to talk about AI, talk about they want to do legislation AI. And we were thought, well, you can't really do that stuff. You know, the foundational stuff that you need to do is around data protection and privacy. So I agree that. I think some of that message is getting across, especially as people see their data being used and these new ways they weren't used before. So we'll see, we'll see definitely, exactly, but so everywhere the world, according to you, Monique and we did everything, you said, What would be your wish for privacy, anywhere in the world, even everybody?

Monique Priestley  40:32

I mean, I think, yeah, I think it's what you were getting at before. I think the pieces that I was, you know, the pieces I was really excited about by the end of the bill that we had was the private right of action and people being able to take action if they were harmed, but also like the data minimization pieces of like and re and rethinking that to be like, not just information that is processed because people already have it and they're selling it and but when they're collecting it and having businesses stop to think, do I actually need all of the information I'm asking for, and do I want crawlers to crawl every and cookies to track every single thing that's being typed and entered onto the internet? But also, like things like we put in the sale, the prohibition on the sale of data. And I think for me, that's like, the big one is anybody I asked, I was like, Do you know around the like, kind of Data Broker conversation? Like, what do you mean? My data is being sold, and so people just don't know. So I feel like, for me, my dream is public awareness and that people start fighting back and being loud and vocal and standing up for themselves and their kids and their grandparents, like anybody who's like I think in general, everybody is a victim and eligible to be a victim, but we definitely have populations that are more susceptible than others, and we have to start looking out for them too.

Debbie Reynolds  41:54

That's a great wish. I share your wish as well, right? We need more protections. I think people just want to live their lives and enjoy things they don't want to have to fight these battles or know that there are things out there that they may not be aware of that could possibly harm them. That's really the point. Yeah, yeah, excellent. And just for you know, I flipped to the business side. You know, businesses are taking on more risk when they're taking on more data, especially they don't know how to protect it. So you know that data minimization part is very important for them. And I think if you tell them, hey, if you do these things more proactively, then you can create less risk for yourself. I think you know, that's probably a good message to send. Yeah,

Monique Priestley  42:39

if anybody listening has more examples. So, I mean, another thing I need is, like, not just experts to testify. I need victims. I need stories of victims. I need, basically, our committee to cry. So but, but that includes businesses. So I have a friend who had a small audio reselling business, and she was a host of a podcast. And so we were talking about how he had a business, and he was using a platform from a bigger global audio retail company. He started to realize that, like, it was tracking customers and then and then trying to, like, beat them to a sale with lower prices and faster sales and coupons and things like that. So he ended up suing them. But like that kind of thing is, like, the I want the businesses to be adjusted, whereas consumers at like the risks that they're at, but also like if they're victims of basically just like being undermined and undercut by the bigger guys, basically without even realizing it, because they may never have been aware that that's happening. But I would love more stories. Again, I need storytelling testimony. So if anybody has more examples of how businesses are being undercut by using platforms without realizing it, that's also super that would be super helpful.

Debbie Reynolds  43:57

Well, you put out the call, so I'm sure people will be flooding your inbox very soon. Stuff, definitely. I know you know all this helps all of us, especially as we know that this is definitely a state by state battle. So I think, you know, we maybe we're creating like a playbook for other states, for sure. I mean, yeah, actually,

Monique Priestley  44:18

I will put in a plug for that too. So, so with that, advocacy groups like we are actually working on a playbook so detailing so that we could share with other states. And also we're starting, you know, I'm collaborating with other states to run the same bill together next year and or run the same like level of protections in the very least, like the big ones that were fate, they Big Data minimization, private action, like that kind of stuff that was like, had the biggest arguments. Like, in the very least we need to match there, but definitely we're documenting, like, the questions that I asked the lobbyists that we interacted with, the lobbyist we saw at the federal level, reporters and watchdog organizations that can help, kind of like, I. Shed some lights, because they are I realized this year how really crucial those entities are and to and just really helpful so all of the things, and then people who can testify, who are experts, common amendments. So there was like, one case where, when I got the Senate bill that was watered down, I sat down with somebody from a tech industry, and I was like, I need to know the source of all of these amendment changes. And he was like, Well, this is that corporation. That's that corporation. That's that corporation that's so, like, I'm basically turning that discussion into a playbook page where it's like, here are the common amendment requests you're going to get, and here's why, and here's why you would, you want to do it or not want to do it? So for sure, playbook coming soon.

Debbie Reynolds  45:46

I'm excited, excited to see that. Well, thank you so much for being on the show. This is great. I know that a lot of people this be very eye opening, for people who don't understand the legislative process and the things that happen, and also reaching out to you and looking at your resources. I'm sure a lot of people be happy to help out

Monique Priestley  46:04

as I would, yeah, and I would love to help other states as well as they're digging into this or other advocacy groups and folks that are trying to make headway in other states, for sure,

Debbie Reynolds  46:13

excellent. Well, thank you so much. Thank you so much, and we'll be talking soon. Thanks, Debbie, thanks

Monique Priestley  46:19

so much.

Debbie Reynolds  46:20

You're welcome. You