California Senate Bill 362 is appropriately called the Delete Act and it aims to make it easier for Californians to request our online personal information to be deleted.
The bill was signed into law this week by Gov. Gavin Newsom.
To be clear, current state law gives you the right to request companies to delete your personal data, but it requires extra steps which could discourage many to even try.
We’re talking about personal information such as addresses, spending habits, employment status, real-time location data and even private financial information. All of this information is gathered and sold by data brokers.
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This new law requires the California Privacy Protection Agency to establish a website by January of 2026, which should be active in August of that same year. It is here where you’ll be able to verify your identity and then make a single request to delete online personal information. There are more than 500 data brokers registered in California.
So how will it work? Well after you submit a deletion request, the data broker will be required to delete all of your personal information once every 45 days. The law will prohibit the data broker from selling or sharing any new personal information that may be received about you.
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California already regulates data brokers, but the delete act would strengthen those provisions by requiring the companies to disclose more information about the data they collect on consumers.
Starting 2028, data brokers will be required to submit to an audit every three years to make sure they are in compliance.
