Montana on the Brain: A Bold Step for Neural Privacy

This is an important development in mental privacy because neural data can be used to derive private information about a person’s mental states, emotions and cognitive functioning, and, according to the Montana Legislature, can even be used to manipulate brain activity.

Montana Senate Bill 163 amends Montana’s Genetic Information Privacy Act to add provisions that apply to neural data in addition to genetic information. Montana legislators passed this bill recognizing that the use of neurotechnologies outside of medical settings was not covered by health data privacy laws, and therefore was left unregulated.