BizTech Law Blog

It’s not uncommon for “covered entities” such as hospitals and health systems to violate the Privacy Rule under the Health Insurance Portability and Protection Act of 1996 (“HIPAA”). A stolen laptop or misplaced file can expose information that should be protected. Rarely, however, does a violation arise from the filming of a television show. But that’s exactly what happened in the case of New York Presbyterian Hospital (“NYP”), which recently entered into a settlement with the Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) for $2.2 million.

The misclassification of employees as independent contractors is a common and serious issue affecting employers and workers in the technology sector. We recently touched on the legal challenges facing “on demand” technology companies such as Uber and Lyft due to their classification of drivers as independent contractors.

But employee vs. independent contractor is not the only classification issue that technology companies and investors must grapple with. As reported by the Wall Street Journal, a Silicon Valley venture capital firm, Fenox Venture Capital, recently agreed to pay $331,269 in back wages after the U.S. Department of Labor (“DOL”) found the company misclassified 56 workers as unpaid interns.