Existing law, the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (CCPA) , grants a consumer various rights with respect to personal information, as defined, that is collected or sold by a business, as defined, including the right to direct a business that collects sensitive personal information about the consumer to limit its use, as prescribed. Existing law defines "sensitive personal information" to mean, among other things, personal information that reveals a consumer's precise geolocation. Existing law, the California Privacy Rights Act of 2020, approved by the voters as Proposition 24 at the November 3, 2020, statewide general election, amended, added to, and reenacted the CCPA. This bill would require a business that collects precise geolocation information to prominently display, when information is being collected, a notice to the consumer whose information is being collected that states certain information related to the collection of the information and its use by the business, including the goods or services requested by the consumer for which the business is collecting, processing, or disclosing the geolocation information and a description of how the business will process the geolocation information to carry out those purposes. This bill would prohibit a business that collects precise geolocation information from, among other things, retaining the information longer than necessary to provide the goods or services requested by the consumer or longer than one year after the consumer's last intentional interaction with the business, whichever is earlier. This bill would declare that its provisions further the purposes and intent of the California Privacy Rights Act of 2020.
Existing law vests the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) with regulatory authority over public utilities, including electrical corporations. Existing law requires the PUC, in consultation with the State Energy Resources Conservation and Development Commission and the Independent System Operator, to take specified actions to facilitate the commercialization of microgrids for distribution customers of large electrical corporations, including developing microgrid service standards necessary to meet state and local permitting requirements and developing methods to reduce barriers for microgrid deployment without shifting costs between ratepayers. This bill would require a large electrical corporation, upon request, to collaborate with local governments, tribal governments, or community choice aggregators within its service area to support resiliency planning, as provided. The bill would require large electrical corporations to provide local governments, tribal governments, and community choice aggregators with access to data, including electrical distribution equipment data, transmission and distribution circuit data, grid hardening plans, and other information as directed by the commission, to support resiliency planning by local governments and tribal governments to ensure local governments, tribal governments, and community choice aggregators are able to plan potential microgrid projects to support critical facilities. The bill would authorize the commission to require large electrical corporations to share this information in aggregated and anonymized form to protect customer privacy and electrical grid security. Under existing law, a violation of any order, decision, rule, direction, demand, or requirement of the PUC is a crime. Because the violation of a PUC action implementing the bill's requirements would be a crime, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.
Existing law requires the State Department of Education, on or before January 1, 2024, to develop a plan to expand mental health instruction in California public schools. This bill would require the department, on or before January 1, 2028, to develop a plan to expand digital wellness instruction in California public schools, as provided.
This measure would urge President Donald J. Trump and Congress to protect and maintain the historic investments made possible by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the CHIPS and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022.
Existing law requires, among other things related to ensuring the safety of companion chatbots, an operator to prevent a companion chatbot on its companion chatbot platform from engaging with users unless the operator maintains a protocol for preventing the production of suicidal ideation, suicide, or self-harm content to the user, as specified. This bill, the Preventing AI User Self Endangerment (PAUSE) Act, would require an operator to adopt and make publicly available a policy governing its protocol for identifying and responding to credible crisis expressions and, for each companion chatbot an operator makes available to users in this state, implement a system for monitoring and detecting credible crisis expressions in user conversations with companion chatbots. The bill would require, if the monitoring system detects a credible crisis expression, the operator to take certain actions, including commence a crisis interruption pause, as specified. The bill would define "credible crisis expression" to mean a statement by a user of a companion chatbot that reasonably indicates, as determined through contextual analysis rather than keyword detection alone, intent to harm the user or others. This bill would require an operator of a companion chatbot to document certain information related to credible crisis expressions and crisis interruption pauses and, beginning January 1, 2028, annually report that information to the Office of Suicide Prevention. The bill would provide for its enforcement, as specified.
Existing law requires a state agency or department that utilizes generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) to directly communicate with a person regarding government services and benefits to ensure that those communications include a disclaimer that indicates to the person that the communication was generated by GenAI, as specified, and information describing how a person may contact a human employee of the state agency or department. This bill would instead require that disclaimer when a state agency or department uses GenAI to directly communicate with the public and would define "directly communicate" to mean to use GenAI, instead of a natural person, to communicate directly with a specific member of the public or to communicate a general public announcement, as specified.
Existing law establishes various privacy protections relating to the collection, use, sale, or distribution of personal information, images, or video recordings, including restrictions relating to the retention, access, use, sale, or sharing of images or video recordings collected through the operation of an in-vehicle camera. This bill would prohibit a security surveillance company, as defined, from distributing, selling, or otherwise authorizing a third party to access, use, or distribute content obtained from a consumer's security surveillance system without first obtaining the express consent of the consumer and the adult residents of a residential rental property or upon receipt of an order of a court or arbitrator.
This bill designates March 22, 2026, as California STEAM Robotics Day to recognize the importance of robotics within science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics education. The measure directly affects schools and educational organizations across the state by providing a specific date for them to host events or activities focused on robotics. It does not create new funding, change laws, or mandate specific actions, but rather serves as a formal proclamation to raise awareness about the field. The legislation was passed by the state legislature and signed into law as part of the 2026 statutes.
Existing law establishes the State Air Resources Board as the state agency responsible for monitoring and regulating sources emitting greenhouse gases. Existing law requires the state board to establish a Carbon Capture, Removal, Utilization, and Storage Program, as provided, to evaluate the efficacy, safety, and viability of carbon capture, utilization, or storage technologies and carbon dioxide removal technologies and facilitate the capture and sequestration of carbon dioxide from those technologies, where appropriate. Existing law requires the Secretary of the Natural Resources Agency, in consultation with the state board, to publish a framework for governing agreements regarding 2 or more tracts of land overlying the same geologic storage reservoir or reservoirs for purposes of managing, developing, and operating a carbon dioxide capture, removal, or sequestration project, as provided. This bill would require the state board to establish and administer the Carbon Dioxide Removal Purchase Program as a competitive grant process for eligible carbon dioxide removal projects, as specified. The bill would require the state board, on or before January 1, 2028, and annually thereafter, to conduct and publish on its internet website a survey of carbon dioxide removal projects existing or in development within the state, and, on or before December 31, 2027, and annually thereafter, until December 31, 2035, to publish on its internet website a report describing Carbon Dioxide Removal Purchase Program activities completed and carbon dioxide removal projects to date, as specified. The bill would require the state board, on or after July 1, 2026, but on or before December 31, 2035, to fund carbon dioxide removal projects in an amount totaling $50,000,000. The bill would authorize up to 10% of that amount to be used to supplement necessary administrative costs in establishing the program. The bill would prohibit carbon dioxide removal projects from exceeding $25,000,000 of grants toward qualified carbon dioxide removals in any one of specified project categories or $12,500,000 of grants towards any one individual carbon dioxide removal project sponsor, except as specified. The bill would require that eligible carbon dioxide removal projects permanently retire the contracted tons of removed carbon dioxide from any future carbon dioxide removals credit issuance. The bill would require the state board, on or before January 1, 2028, to adopt guidelines, including the definition of an eligible carbon dioxide removal project, for the program, which the bill would require to be consistent with certain provisions governing carbon dioxide capture, removal, or sequestration projects, as specified. The bill would make implementation of these provisions contingent upon an appropriation by the Legislature for purposes of the program. The bill would require all funds to be available for encumbrance or expenditure until June 30, 2035, and to be available for liquidation until June 30, 2035.
(1) Existing law prohibits the false impersonation of another person in either their personal or official capacity with the intent to steal or defraud, as specified. This bill would define various terms related to artificial intelligence and digital replication, and would clarify that false impersonation includes the use of a digital replica with the intent to impersonate another for purposes of these and other criminal provisions. (2) Existing law creates a civil cause of action against any person who knowingly uses the name, voice, signature, photograph, or likeness of another person, without their consent, for specified purposes. When a photograph or likeness of an employee of the person using the photograph or likeness appearing in an advertisement or other publication is incidental and not essential to the purpose of the publication, existing law establishes a rebuttable presumption affecting the burden of producing evidence that failure to obtain the consent of an employee was not a knowing use of an employee's photograph or likeness. This bill would clarify that, for purposes of this cause of action, a voice or likeness includes a digital replica, as defined. The bill would also remove the provisions establishing the rebuttable presumption when an employee's likeness or photograph appears in an advertisement or other publication. (3) Existing law governs the admissibility of evidence in court proceedings. Existing law prescribes procedures for the authentication of photographs and audio and video recordings. This bill would require the Judicial Council, by no later than January 1, 2027, to review the impact of artificial intelligence on the admissibility of proffered evidence in court proceedings and develop any necessary rules of court to assist courts in assessing claims that proffered evidence has been generated by or manipulated by artificial intelligence and determining whether such evidence is admissible. (4) Existing law, the Unfair Competition Law, establishes a statutory cause of action for unfair competition, including any unlawful, unfair, or fraudulent business act or practice and unfair, deceptive, untrue, or misleading advertising, and establishes remedies and penalties in that regard, including civil penalties. This bill would require, by December 1, 2026, and except as provided, any person or entity that makes available to consumers any artificial intelligence technology that enables a user to create a digital replica, as defined, to provide a consumer warning that unlawful use of the technology to depict another person without prior consent may result in civil or criminal liability for the user. The bill would require the warning to be hyperlinked on any page or screen where the consumer may input a prompt to the technology and included in the terms and conditions for use of the technology. The bill would also impose a civil penalty for violations of the requirement. This bill would incorporate additional changes to Section 3344 of the Civil Code proposed by SB 683 to be operative only if this bill and SB 683 are enacted and this bill is enacted last.
