Massachusetts has no comprehensive consumer privacy statute, so obligations there come from its breach-notification law, sector-specific rules and federal statutes. This page collects our coverage touching Massachusetts. For the underlying law rather than the news, see our Massachusetts privacy law page.
Background Checks
October 12, 2026
Massachusetts runs criminal record checks through a state system with tiered access. An employer or landlord sees convictions only within fixed lookback windows, must collect a signed acknowledgment and check identification first, must hand the record to the applicant before asking about it, and holds the result under storage and logging rules set by regulation.
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Employee Privacy
October 12, 2026
Section 52C of chapter 149 gives current and former Massachusetts employees a right to review and copy their personnel record within five business days of a written request, to be told within ten days when negative information is added, and to file a rebuttal that travels with the record. The Attorney General enforces it; courts have recognized a narrower personal remedy.
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Privacy Litigation
October 12, 2026
In Vita v. New England Baptist Hospital the Supreme Judicial Court split 5 to 1 over whether browsing a hospital's public website is a wire communication under the Massachusetts wiretap act. The majority found the word ambiguous and applied the rule of lenity. The dissent read 'any communication' as plain. Bills filed in 2025 to rewrite the definitions went to study.
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