Illinois Health-Care Workers Protected by State Biometrics Law

An Illinois nurse can pursue her lawsuit alleging her employer’s medication dispensing system unlawfully collects, uses, and retains the biometric data of her and other workers, following a ruling by a state appeals court.

Northwestern Lake Forest Hospital was wrong that an exclusion in the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act exempting both patients and information already protected by the federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act from BIPA coverage extends to health-care employees, the Illinois Appellate Court said Feb. 25.

The hospital pointed to BIPA Section 10, which says that protected biometric identifiers—such as the fingerprint scans that Yana Mazya ...