PRIVACY: You may soon have the right to know when you’ve been hacked.

Speaking at a panel hosted by the National Cyber Security Alliance, a public-private partnership for online security and privacy, the acting Federal Trade Commission Chairman Maureen Ohlhausen said legislation may soon be on the way. The FTC regulates businesses to protect consumers, and can penalize hacked companies under Section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act — even though it wasn’t originally written for online issues — because it targets companies for “unfair or deceptive acts or practices.” Although 47 out of 50 U.S. states have their own data breach laws, no federal requirements exist.

“Congress, over the past several years, has been interested in having a national data security and breach notification law, and that is coming back of interest again,” Ohlhausen said. “That could be a very useful tool for the FTC, and has been supported by the FTC on a bipartisan basis for a number of years.”

Maybe the public should also have the right to know when our elected and cabinet-level officeholders have been hacked.