A new bill passed by California lawmakers on Thursday night would allow residents to request that their personal information held by data brokers be deleted, and to opt out of future tracking.
Senate Bill 362, or the “Delete Act,” would require that a website is established so that consumers can “request that every data broker that maintains any personal information delete any personal information related to that consumer held by the data broker or associated service provider or contractor.”
That information, according to DeleteMe co-founder Rob Shavell, includes, “home address, their name, their phone number, cell phone, their family members. The kind of information that constitutes a profile.”
If the bill does become a law, data brokers will have to delete the information every 45 days.
Data brokers, however, believe the bill will do more harm than good.
Dan Smith, president of the Consumer Data Industry Association, said in a release that the Delete Act would lead to “unintended consequences.”
“It would undermine consumer fraud protections, curb small businesses' ability to compete, hurt mission-driven nonprofits, and empower third-party 'pay to delete' services at consumers' expense,” he said.
The bill heads to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s desk. If signed, it would go into effect August 2026.
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