When Big Companies are Hacked, Should they Have to Disclose it Immediately? | Recode

“It’s not the crime, it’s the cover-up.”

That old truism from the Watergate affair also applies to the scandals plaguing some of the world’s biggest tech companies, says NYU professor Scott Galloway. On the latest episode of Pivot, he and Recode’s Kara Swisher talked about the Google+ hack that the company sat on for months and did not disclose until the Wall Street Journal came knocking.

“This is probably why [Google] didn’t show up for the Senate hearings,” Galloway said. “What if someone had said to them, ‘Are you aware of any hacks?’ Do they perjure themselves, or do they release that data in front of Congress, in front of national TV?”

Swisher said the incident makes the internet bill of rights drafted by Democrats in Congress even more relevant. One of the proposed rights that Rep. Ro Khanna discussed on a recent episode of Recode Decode is the right of consumers to be notified in a timely fashion in the event of a security breach.

“Everyone’s like, ‘Oh, it’s not used that much,’” she said of Google+, which the company now plans to shut down. “But 500,000 people … Google not protecting your data, really, is the point. And then not telling you about these breaches to me is again the same problem, that there is not a federal law that requires immediate disclosure of these hacks.”

Source: When Big Companies are Hacked, Should they Have to Disclose it Immediately? | Recode