BILL ANALYSIS Ó AB 179 Page 1 ASSEMBLY THIRD READING AB 179 (Bocanegra and Levine) As Amended April 24, 2013 Majority vote TRANSPORTATION 16-0 APPROPRIATIONS 16-0 ----------------------------------------------------------------- |Ayes:|Lowenthal, Linder, |Ayes:|Gatto, Harkey, Bigelow, | | |Achadjian, Ammiano, | |Bocanegra, Bradford, Ian | | |Blumenfield, Bonta, | |Calderon, Campos, Eggman, | | |Buchanan, Daly, Frazier, | |Gomez, Hall, Ammiano, | | |Gatto, Holden, Logue, | |Linder, Pan, Quirk, | | |Morrell, Nazarian, | |Wagner, Weber | | |Patterson, Quirk-Silva | | | |-----+--------------------------+-----+--------------------------| | | | | | ----------------------------------------------------------------- SUMMARY : Expands privacy protections currently afforded to electronic toll collection subscribers to include users of electronic transit fare collection systems. Specifically, this bill : 1)Expands provisions of existing law related to ensuring the privacy of electronic toll collection system subscribers to include users of public transit systems that employ electronic transit fare collections systems. 2)Specifically provides that, with respect to the prohibition against sharing personally identifiable information, the prohibition does not apply to the sharing of data between transportation agencies for the sole purpose of providing interoperability between the agencies. 3)Expands the definition of "transportation agency" to include any transportation agency that administers an electronic transit fare collection system and any transit operator participating in that system. 4)Defines "electronic transit fare collection system" to mean a system for issuing electronic transit passes that allow passengers to use the transit systems of one or more transit operators without having to pay individual fares. AB 179 Page 2 EXISTING LAW : 1)Defines, for purposes of privacy provisions related to electronic toll collections systems, "transportation agency" as the Department of Transportation, the Bay Area Toll Authority, any entity operating a toll bridge, toll lane, or toll highway, or any entity operating under contract with such an agency. 2)Prohibits transportation agencies from selling or disseminating personally identifiable information about persons who subscribe to an electronic toll collection system, with limited exceptions. 3)Requires transportation agencies that use electronic toll collection systems to establish privacy policies and to provide those policies to subscribers. 4)Authorizes transportation agencies to store specific account-related information such as an account holder's name, credit card number, vehicle information, and billing address; all other information must be discarded within four years and six months after the closure date of the billing cycle and after the bill has been paid and all toll violations, if applicable, have been resolved. 5)Requires transportation agencies to make every effort to purge data on closed accounts; in no case may data be stored longer than four years and six months after an account has been closed or terminated. 6)Allows transportation agencies to make personally identifiable information available to law enforcement agencies pursuant to a search warrant; generally requires a law enforcement agency to notify, within five days, a person that their information has been obtained from a transportation agency. 7)Allows peace officers conducting criminal or traffic collision investigations to obtain personally identifiable information of subscribers without a search warrant if the officer has good cause to believe that a delay in obtaining the information via a search warrant would cause an adverse result, as defined. AB 179 Page 3 8)Allows transportation agencies to provide aggregated traveler information derived from collective data that relates to a group or category of subscribers, provided that personally identifiable information has been removed. 9)Allows data to be shared among transportation agencies, in order to comply with state inter-operability requirements for electronic toll collection systems. 10)Authorizes a transportation agency to impose an administrative fee to cover costs associated with implementing these privacy requirements. 11)Provides, generally, that video recordings made by security systems on public transit systems must be retained for one year. FISCAL EFFECT : According to the Assembly Appropriations Committee, any additional costs to local transit agencies will not be state-reimbursable, because the agencies have existing authority to recover their costs through administrative fees. COMMENTS : The author introduced this bill to protect the privacy of public transportation patrons who use an electronic transit pass by limiting the use of personal information that is collected every time the pass is swiped, or tapped. This bill's introduction follows media accounts of privacy concerns related to electronic fare collection systems. One such system is the "Clipper" card system used in the San Francisco Bay Area. The Clipper card allows a transit user to pay fares on multiple transit systems using one card. Users can add value to their card at any point or they can set up their card to automatically reload whenever their pass expires or their cash balance falls below $10. Users of the Clipper card are not required to register their card, however. If a card is unregistered, use of the system is linked to the card's serial number only and the system has no personal information about the cardholder. The Clipper card privacy policy states that, for patrons who choose to register their Clipper card, their personally identifiable information may be disclosed to third-party service providers (e.g., contractor personnel who operate and maintain AB 179 Page 4 the Clipper card service) for the purpose of operating and maintaining the Clipper system; otherwise, personal information is not to be disclosed to third parties, except as required by law, ordered by a court of competent jurisdiction, or where the express written consent of the cardholder has been obtained. The Transit Access Pass system in the Los Angeles area and the Compass card system in the San Diego area operate similar to the Clipper card system and both have nearly identical privacy policies. Writing in support of this bill, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) argues, "Location privacy issues are of serious concern to the ACLU. [AB 179] extends the privacy protections already in place to another transit system that creates and stores digital records of people's movements. Divorce lawyers and law enforcement agencies are very interested in obtaining records of individual's movements. It's important to have clear and consistent standards in place." Opponents of this bill raise a number of concerns related to safety, data retention, and interoperability. For example, both the Orange County Transportation Authority and the Riverside Transit Agency are opposing the bill, in part, because they believe the bill will hinder their ability to share video surveillance information captured on its buses with police without a search warrant or good cause. Both agencies are concerned that delaying the release of this information poses a safety risk to the community by impeding successful apprehension of criminals or successful recovery of missing persons. Previous legislation : AB 839 (Salinas), Chapter 564, Statutes of 2003, provides that videotapes or recordings made by a security camera system operated as part of a public transit system must be retained for one year. SB 1268 (Simitian), Chapter 489, Statutes of 2010, imposed privacy protections on electronic toll collection systems. Analysis Prepared by : Janet Dawson / TRANS. / (916) 319-2093 FN: 0000460 AB 179 Page 5