BILL NUMBER: S1551
SPONSOR: PARKER
 
TITLE OF BILL:
An act to amend the public service law, in relation to prohibiting the
release of consumption data
 
PURPOSE OF BILL:
To establish consumer consumption data privacy by prohibiting law
enforcement entities access without a judicial court-ordered subpoena,
warrant, or the consumers written, knowing consent.
 
SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS:
This bill will prohibit a utility corporation, municipality or local
publicly owned electric or gas corporation from sharing, disclosing,
otherwise making accessible, or allow a third-party to share, disclose
or otherwise make accessible a consumer's electrical or gas consumption
data, to any law enforcement entity without a judicial court-ordered
subpoena, warrant or the consumers written, knowing consent. This subdi-
vision shall not preclude a utility corporation, municipality or local
publicly owned electric or gas corporation from using customer aggregate
electrical consumption data for analysis, reporting, or program manage-
ment if all personal identifying information has been removed regarding
such individual consumers.
 
JUSTIFICATION:
Public Utility data, also known as smart meter data, is particularly
sensitive as it can reveal where a person lives, the number of people in
a household, and when an individual is home. This bill intends to
provide privacy protection by requiring law enforcement entities to
produce a judicial court-ordered subpoena, warrant or the consumers
written, knowing consent to access this data.
 
PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:
2023-24: S2710- Committed to Rules
2021-22: S3019 - Committed to Rules
2019/20: S9040- Referred to Rules
 
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS FOR-E AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS:
None.
 
EFFECTIVE DATE:
This act shall take effect immediately.

Statutes affected:
S1551: 65 public service law