BILL NUMBER: S8850
SPONSOR: GOUNARDES
 
TITLE OF BILL:
An act to amend the general business law, in relation to establishing
the NY digital choice act
 
PURPOSE OR GENERAL IDEA OF BILL:
To establish interoperability and portability standards pertaining to a
user's social graph and to allow covered users to delete certain data.
 
SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS:
Section one of this bill creates a new Article 48 with the following
sections:
Section 1800: Provides a short title
Section 1801: Provides definitions
Section 1802: Establishes portability standards for the social graphs of
covered users
Section 1803: Establish an interoperability interface that utilizes an
open protocol and allows for synchronous data sharing. Provides security
and privacy guidelines and establishes exemptions.
Section 1804: Provides covered users with the ability to delete data
associated their social graph and social media accounts.
Section 1805: Provides rulemaking authority to identify open protocols
as are necessary to effectuate section 1803 of this act.
Section 1806: Provides for Attorney General enforcement.
Section 1807: Severability
Section 2 of this bill sets the effective date.
 
JUSTIFICATION:
With over 250 million Americans on at least one social media platform,
living our lives online is more common than ever. These platforms allow
Americans to connect with family and friends and to meet new people. For
some, engaging on social media platforms has become how they make a
living. However, if a new social media company arises with better
features, users face a stark choice: begin anew on a platform, losing
their previous connections and/or work; or stay on a substandard plat-
form. This anticompetitive practice has hurt both users and startups
that want to offer new features.
The Digital Choice Act would require that platforms, upon a user's
request, allow users to export their "social graph" - a shared set of a
user's actions on social media. By requiring all platforms to use inter-
operable formats, the Digital Choice Act lets users easily transfer
their data elsewhere, expanding consumer choice. Key to this data aggre-
gation is consent and privacy. No data can be aggregated in this fashion
except with the explicit consent of the user. Even then, users retain
the ability to mark certain data private.
Utilizing a user's portable social graph, the Digital Choice Act further
affords users the ability to delete their data from social media plat-
forms. Finally, this bill requires platforms to utilize an accessible,
interoperable interface for users and other platforms to port their
social graphs, similar to how cell phone customers can port their
contacts and numbers into a new device when they switch providers. While
cell carriers used to disallow this practice, requiring consumers to
call all of their current contacts one by one to manually relay their
new number, regulations have since abolished this deeply anticompetitive
practice, offering consumers true choice and fostering competition and a
healthier carrier marketplace. That same concept applies here.
The Digital Choice Act is far from novel. This bill is nearly identical
to a bill already passed into law in Utah by the same name. Any social
media company operating in Utah, which is to say virtually all of them,
already needs to comply with every major provision of this bill. By
providing increased rights to users, maintaining privacy and security,
facilitating data exchange, and adding no new compliance burden, the
Digital Choice Act offers effective and balanced regulation in a space
where it is badly needed.
 
PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:
None
 
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:
None
 
EFFECTIVE DATE:
This act shall take effect ninety days after it shall have become a law.