Compliance Officers and Law Enforcement: Friends or Foes?
April 01, 2018
<b><i>Part Two of a Two-Part Article</b></i><p>As we saw in Part One, regulators have recently shown a tendency to focus on compliance officers who they deem to have failed to ensure that the compliance and anti-money laundering (AML) programs that they oversee adequately prevented corporate wrongdoing, and there are several indications that regulators will continue to target compliance officers in 2018 in actions focused on Bank Secrecy Act/AML compliance.
Right of Entry: Landlord Considerations
April 01, 2018
One of the key requirements of a lease, from a landlord's viewpoint, is that it ensures the landlord has the ability to access a tenant's space. When preparing a lease for a landlord, consider including the following items to make sure that the landlord is permitted access to all spaces on the premises at all appropriate times.
Industry Workplace Misconduct Investigations
April 01, 2018
The important ongoing industry and national conversation about sexual harassment is serving as a wake-up call to entertainment companies, board members and C-suite executives about the need to be proactive when confronted with allegations of harassment or other workplace misconduct.
Why Tenants Get Stuck in Bad Leases and How to Avoid It
April 01, 2018
Tenants end up signing leases that offer little to no flexibility as their businesses expand and contract, setting the stage for economic and operational stress that could have been avoided with upfront planning and prudent lease negotiations.
Supreme Court Ties SEC's Hands in Whistleblower Case
April 01, 2018
With its decision in <i>Digital Realty v. Somers</i>, the U.S. Supreme Court dealt a blow to companies interested in learning of their own securities violations before the government gets the heads-up. The case's outcome means whistleblowers who might have reported violations internally will be incentivized to bypass their own companies' compliance mechanisms in favor of immediate reporting to the SEC.
Walking the Fine Line of Fair Use: The Second Circuit's Decision in <i>Fox News v. TVEyes</i>
April 01, 2018
Only a small fraction of television news broadcasts are made available online. For a party to monitor and view all news coverage of an event, it would essentially have to watch and record all news broadcasts 24/7. That's exactly what media-monitoring service TVEyes did. There was no dispute that TVEyes had copied Fox News's content. Instead, the issue was whether TVEyes's service constituted fair use.
Cyber Risk Assessments are a Critical Component of All Cybersecurity Programs
April 01, 2018
Many companies remain overwhelmed by the prospect of developing a cybersecurity program. Too many still see cyber crime as an IT issue, and simply defer to that department. Cybersecurity is most definitely an information security issue and it must be treated as such. Failure to recognize this concept almost ensures a weak cybersecurity program that remains highly vulnerable to breaches.
As It Turns Out, <i>Yellowstone</i> Waivers Are Enforceable
April 01, 2018
Four years ago, we explored whether a commercial tenant could waive its common law right to seek a <i>Yellowstone</i> Injunction. At that time, there was no appellate authority directly on point. This all changed on Jan. 31, 2018, when the Appellate Division, Second Department ruled in <i>159 MP Corp., v Redbridge Bedford, LLC</i> that the “commercial tenants' voluntary and limited waiver of declaratory judgment remedies in their written lease is valid and enforceable, and not violative of New York's public policy …”
DOL's New Rules on ERISA Claims Procedure for Disability Benefits
April 01, 2018
The Department of Labor (DOL) issued regulations that revise the ERISA claims procedure regulations for employee benefit plans that provide disability benefits. The scope of the new regulations are broader than you may realize and apply to any plan, regardless of how it is characterized, that provides benefits or rights that are contingent on whether the plan determines an individual to be disabled.
