Data Security Prompts the 10th Amendment

The U.S. Constitution is an amazing document for its applicability to today’s issues and today’s technology, and even to federal government procrastination. Rep. Daniel Zolnikov had a great visit with Eric Fulton of Keybase I.O. about data ownership and the right to privacy in the digital age. Without federal guidelines for data security, some states have passed and enacted their own laws, much to the consternation of the tech companies.

States’ authority to create their own regulations comes from the 10^th Amendment:

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Whenever states have set their own laws and standards on an issue, the buzzword that leaps out is “patchwork.” Large industries, including big tech, would much prefer regulation from a central federal government (that they can influence and somewhat control) than a patchwork of laws across all fifty states.  The corporations can’t keep track of fifty sets of regulation where each can change with every legislative session.

This is the result of an industry that didn’t self-regulate and a central government that didn’t address the issue.

And backed by a plan of government established in the 18^th century.