New technologies continue to invade the workplace, from biometrics to artificial intelligence. With the benefits come legal concerns for employers. In the latest issue of Mainebiz, employment and labor attorneys Tawny Alvarez and Rob Brooks discuss the legal liability collecting large amounts of data brings. In the article Tawny explains, “We’re at a time in the United States when we don’t have any federal law that oversees the collection of this biometric data from an employment standpoint, but we’re seeing more and more states that are stepping in and creating statutes to protect consumers and employees from the use of this data, because it’s an asset.” Tawny and Rob offer some insights into how employers should proceed with the creation of policies, including an outline of what the data will be used for, who will have access to it, and how the data will be destroyed, and when. Rob suggests, “Before a business starts collecting this kind of data, they should ask themselves, ‘Do we really need to collect it?’ and then evaluate how much it’s going to cost to protect that information from inappropriate disclosure.”

Read the full Mainebiz article online here.