2026 SESSION
INTRODUCED
26100812D
SENATE BILL NO. 85
Offered January 14, 2026
Prefiled December 30, 2025
A BILL to amend and reenact §§ 59.1-575 and 59.1-577 of the Code of Virginia and to amend the Code of Virginia by adding a section numbered 59.1-577.2, relating to Consumer Data Protection Act; social media platforms and model operators; interoperability interfaces.
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Patron—VanValkenburg
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Referred to Committee on General Laws and Technology
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Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:
1. That §§ 59.1-575 and 59.1-577 of the Code of Virginia are amended and reenacted and that the Code of Virginia is amended by adding a section numbered 59.1-577.2 as follows:
§ 59.1-575. Definitions.
As used in this chapter, unless the context requires a different meaning:
"Affiliate" means a legal entity that controls, is controlled by, or is under common control with another legal entity or shares common branding with another legal entity. For the purposes of this definition, "control" or "controlled" means (i) ownership of, or the power to vote, more than 50 percent of the outstanding shares of any class of voting security of a company; (ii) control in any manner over the election of a majority of the directors or of individuals exercising similar functions; or (iii) the power to exercise controlling influence over the management of a company.
"Artificial intelligence" means a machine-based system that can, for a given set of human-defined objectives, make predictions, recommendations, or decisions influencing real or virtual environments and that uses machine-based and human-based inputs to perceive real and virtual environments, abstract such perceptions into models through analysis in an automated manner, and use model inference to formulate options for information or action.
"Artificial intelligence model" means an information system or component of an information system that implements artificial intelligence technology and uses computational, statistical, or machine-learning techniques to produce outputs from a given set of inputs.
"Authenticate" means verifying through reasonable means that the consumer, entitled to exercise his consumer rights in § 59.1-577, is the same consumer exercising such consumer rights with respect to the personal data at issue.
"Biometric data" means data generated by automatic measurements of an individual's biological characteristics, such as a fingerprint, a voiceprint, eye retinas, irises, or other unique biological patterns or characteristics that is are used to identify a specific individual. "Biometric data" does not include a physical or digital photograph, a video or audio recording or data generated therefrom, or information collected, used, or stored for health care treatment, payment, or operations under HIPAA.
"Business associate" means the same meaning as the term established by HIPAA.
"Child" means any natural person younger than 13 years of age.
"Consent" means a clear affirmative act signifying a consumer's freely given, specific, informed, and unambiguous agreement to process personal data relating to the consumer. Consent may include a written statement, including a statement written by electronic means, or any other unambiguous affirmative action.
"Consumer" means a natural person who is a resident of the Commonwealth acting only in an individual or household context. It "Consumer" does not include a natural person acting in a commercial or employment context.
"Contextual data" means any information provided by a user to an artificial intelligence model and any context or derivative data associated with such user's interactions with such model, including prompts, conversational histories, files, preferences, metadata, and any such model-generated or inferred data linked to or generated from such interactions. "Contextual data" does not include the trade secrets associated with an artificial intelligence model.
"Controller" means the natural or legal person that, alone or jointly with others, determines the purpose and means of processing personal data.
"Covered entity" means the same as the term is established by HIPAA.
"Decisions that produce legal or similarly significant effects concerning a consumer" means a decision made by the controller that results in the provision or denial by the controller of financial and lending services, housing, insurance, education enrollment, criminal justice, employment opportunities, health care services, or access to basic necessities, such as food and water.
"De-identified data" means data that cannot reasonably be linked to an identified or identifiable natural person, or a device linked to such person. A controller that possesses "de-identified data" shall comply with the requirements of subsection A of § 59.1-581.
"Health record" means the same as that term is defined in § 32.1-127.1:03.
"Health care provider" means the same as that term is defined in § 32.1-276.3.
"HIPAA" means the federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (42 U.S.C. § 1320d et seq.).
"Identified or identifiable natural person" means a person who can be readily identified, directly or indirectly.
"Institution of higher education" means a public institution and private institution of higher education, as those terms are defined in § 23.1-100.
"Model operator" means a person that makes an artificial intelligence model available for use by another person, including by license or contract. "Model operator" does not include a person that solely interacts with an artificial intelligence model through application programming interfaces, licensed services, prompting, or fine tuning.
"Nonprofit organization" means any corporation organized under the Virginia Nonstock Corporation Act (§ 13.1-801 et seq.) or any organization exempt from taxation under § 501(c)(3), 501(c)(6), or 501(c)(12) of the Internal Revenue Code, any political organization, any organization exempt from taxation under § 501(c)(4) of the Internal Revenue Code that is identified in § 52-41, and any subsidiary or affiliate of entities organized pursuant to Chapter 9.1 (§ 56-231.15 et seq.) of Title 56.
"Online service, product, or feature" means any service, product, or feature that is provided online. "Online service, product, or feature" does not include telecommunications service, as defined in 47 U.S.C. § 153, broadband Internet access service, as defined in 47 C.F.R. § 54.400, or delivery or use of a physical product.
"Open protocol" means a free and publicly available set of rules, without patent restrictions, that enables interoperability and data exchange between social media platforms that have a common data infrastructure such that multiple social media platforms can access the social graph data of a user.
"Parent" means a parent or legal guardian of a child or minor.
"Personal data" means any information that is linked or reasonably linkable to an identified or identifiable natural person. "Personal data" does not include de-identified data or publicly available information.
"Political organization" means a party, committee, association, fund, or other organization, whether or not incorporated, organized and operated primarily for the purpose of influencing or attempting to influence the selection, nomination, election, or appointment of any individual to any federal, state, or local public office or office in a political organization or the election of a presidential/vice-presidential elector, whether or not such individual or elector is selected, nominated, elected, or appointed.
"Precise geolocation data" means information derived from technology, including but not limited to global positioning system level latitude and longitude coordinates or other mechanisms, that directly identifies the specific location of a natural person with precision and accuracy within a radius of 1,750 feet. "Precise geolocation data" does not include the content of communications or any data generated by or connected to advanced utility metering infrastructure systems or equipment for use by a utility.
"Process" or "processing" means any operation or set of operations performed, whether by manual or automated means, on personal data or on sets of personal data, such as the collection, use, storage, disclosure, analysis, deletion, or modification of personal data.
"Processor" means a natural or legal entity that processes personal data on behalf of a controller.
"Profiling" means any form of automated processing performed on personal data to evaluate, analyze, or predict personal aspects related to an identified or identifiable natural person's economic situation, health, personal preferences, interests, reliability, behavior, location, or movements.
"Protected health information" means the same as the term is established by HIPAA.
"Pseudonymous data" means personal data that cannot be attributed to a specific natural person without the use of additional information, provided that such additional information is kept separately and is subject to appropriate technical and organizational measures to ensure that the personal data is not attributed to an identified or identifiable natural person.
"Publicly available information" means information that is lawfully made available through federal, state, or local government records, or information that a business has a reasonable basis to believe is lawfully made available to the general public through widely distributed media, by the consumer, or by a person to whom the consumer has disclosed the information, unless the consumer has restricted the information to a specific audience.
"Sale of personal data" means the exchange of personal data for monetary consideration by the controller to a third party. "Sale of personal data" does not include:
1. The disclosure of personal data to a processor that processes the personal data on behalf of the controller;
2. The disclosure of personal data to a third party for purposes of providing a product or service requested by the consumer;
3. The disclosure or transfer of personal data to an affiliate of the controller;
4. The disclosure of information that the consumer (i) intentionally made available to the general public via a channel of mass media and (ii) did not restrict to a specific audience; or
5. The disclosure or transfer of personal data to a third party as an asset that is part of a merger, acquisition, bankruptcy, or other transaction in which the third party assumes control of all or part of the controller's assets.
"Sensitive data" means a category of personal data that includes:
1. Personal data revealing racial or ethnic origin, religious beliefs, mental or physical health diagnosis, sexual orientation, or citizenship or immigration status;
2. The processing of genetic or biometric data for the purpose of uniquely identifying a natural person;
3. The personal data collected from a known child; or
4. Precise geolocation data.
"Social graph data" means the personal data of an identified or identifiable natural person together with any other data that represents the connections and interactions of such person within a social media platform. "Social graph data" includes the:
1. Content generated by such person;
2. Social connections of such person with other users, including such person's followers and the users that such person follows;
3. Responses of such person to the content of other users, including comments, reactions, mentions, reposts, shares, and other engagements;
4. Public profile of such person;
5. Metadata associated with the data elements in subdivisions 1 through 4; and
6. Relational references sufficient to maintain the associations among data elements described in subdivisions 1 through 4.
"Social graph data" does not include the content and responses of other users that have been designated as private by those users, including private messages.
"Social media platform" means a public or semipublic Internet-based service or application that has users in the Commonwealth and that meets the following criteria:
1. Connects users in order to allow users to interact socially with each other within such service or application. No service or application that exclusively provides email or direct messaging services shall be considered to meet this criterion on the basis of that function alone; and
2. Allows users to do all of the following:
a. Construct a public or semipublic profile for purposes of signing into and using such service or application;
b. Populate a public list of other users with whom such user shares a social connection within such service or application; and
c. Create or post content viewable by other users, including content on message boards, in chat rooms, or through a landing page or main feed that presents the user with content generated by other users. No service or application that consists primarily of news, sports, entertainment, ecommerce, or content preselected by the provider and not generated by users, and for which any chat, comments, or interactive functionality is incidental to, directly related to, or dependent on the provision of such content, or that is for interactive gaming, shall be considered to meet this criterion on the basis of that function alone.
"State agency" means the same as that term is defined in § 2.2-307.
"Targeted advertising" means displaying advertisements to a consumer where the advertisement is selected based on personal data obtained from that consumer's activities over time and across nonaffiliated websites or online applications to predict such consumer's preferences or interests. "Targeted advertising" does not include:
1. Advertisements based on activities within a controller's own websites or online applications;
2. Advertisements based on the context of a consumer's current search query, visit to a website, or online application;
3. Advertisements directed to a consumer in response to the consumer's request for information or feedback; or
4. Processing personal data processed solely for measuring or reporting advertising performance, reach, or frequency.
"Third party" means a natural or legal person, public authority, agency, or body other than the consumer, controller, processor, or an affiliate of the processor or the controller.
"User" means a person not acting as an agent of a controller or processor.
§ 59.1-577. Personal data rights; consumers.
A. A consumer may invoke the consumer rights authorized pursuant to this subsection at any time by submitting a request to a controller specifying the consumer rights the consumer wishes to invoke. A known child's parent or legal guardian may invoke such consumer rights on behalf of the child regarding processing personal data belonging to the known child. A controller shall comply with an authenticated consumer request to exercise the right:
1. To confirm whether or not a controller is processing the consumer's personal data and to access such personal data;
2. To correct inaccuracies in the consumer's personal data, taking into account the nature of the personal data and the purposes of the processing of the consumer's personal data;
3. To delete personal data, including social graph data processed by a social media platform and contextual data processed by a model operator, provided by or obtained about the consumer;
4. To obtain a copy of the consumer's personal data, including social graph data processed by a social media platform and contextual data processed by a model operator, that the consumer previously provided to the controller in a portable and, to the extent technically feasible, readily usable format that allows the consumer to transmit the data to another controller without hindrance, where the processing is carried out by automated means, provided that the controller shall not be required to reveal any trade secret; and
5. To opt out of the processing of the personal data for purposes of (i) targeted advertising, (ii) the sale of personal data, or (iii) profiling in furtherance of decisions that produce legal or similarly significant effects concerning the consumer.
B. Except as otherwise provided in this chapter, a controller shall comply with a request by a consumer to exercise the consumer rights authorized pursuant to subsection A as follows:
1. A controller shall respond to the consumer without undue delay, but in all cases within 45 days of receipt of the request submitted pursuant to the methods described in subsection A. The response period may be extended once by 45 additional days when reasonably necessary, taking into account the complexity and number of the consumer's requests, so long as the controller informs the consumer of any such extension within the initial 45-day response period, together with the reason for the extension.
2. If a controller declines to take action regarding the consumer's request, the controller shall inform the consumer without undue delay, but in all cases and at the latest within 45 days of receipt of the request, of the justification for declining to take action and instructions for how to appeal the decision pursuant to subsection C.
3. Information provided in response to a consumer request shall be provided by a controller free of charge, up to twice annually per consumer. If requests from a consumer are manifestly unfounded, excessive, or repetitive, the controller may charge the consumer a reasonable fee to cover the administrative costs of complying with the request or decline to act on the request. The controller bears the burden of demonstrating the manifestly unfounded, excessive, or repetitive nature of the request.
4. If a controller is unable to authenticate the request using commercially reasonable efforts, the controller shall not be required to comply with a request to initiate an action under subsection A and may request that the consumer provide additional information reasonably necessary to authenticate the consumer and the consumer's request.
5. A controller that has obtained personal data about a consumer from a source other than the consumer shall be deemed in compliance with a consumer's request to delete such data pursuant to subdivision A 3 by either (i) retaining a record of the deletion request and the minimum data necessary for the purpose of ensuring the consumer's personal data remains deleted from the business's records and not using such retained data for any other purpose pursuant to the provisions of this chapter or (ii) opting the consumer out of the processing of such personal data for any purpose except for those exempted pursuant to the provisions of this chapter.
6. A controller that uses an artificial intelligence model provided by a third-party model operator to provide applications or services to a consumer shall promptly transmit a consumer's request to the model operator with sufficient information for the model operator to execute the request and communicate about the request with the consumer.
C. A controller shall establish a process for a consumer to appeal the controller's refusal to take action on a request within a reasonable period of time after the consumer's receipt of the decision pursuant to subdivision B 2. The appeal process shall be conspicuously available and similar to the process for submitting requests to initiate action pursuant to subsection A. Within 60 days of receipt of an appeal, a controller shall inform the consumer in writing of any action taken or not taken in response to the appeal, including a written explanation of the reasons for the decisions. If the appeal is denied, the controller shall also provide the consumer with an online mechanism, if available, or other method through which the consumer may contact the Attorney General to submit a complaint.
§ 59.1-577.2. Social media platforms and model operators; interoperability interfaces.
A. A social media platform shall implement a third party-accessible interoperability interface to allow a user to share his social graph data directly with other social media platforms as he designates and enable those social media platforms to be notified when new or updated social graph data is available. The social media platform shall provide a mechanism by which a user may submit a request to share such data as he designates and shall fulfill such a request within a reasonable time frame.
B. A model operator shall implement a third party-accessible interoperability interface to allow a user to share his contextual data directly with other artificial intelligence models as he designates and enable those artificial intelligence models to be notified when new or updated contextual data is available. The model operator shall provide a mechanism by which a user may submit a request to share such data as he designates and shall fulfill such a request within a reasonable time frame.
C. To achieve interoperability as described by this section, social media platforms and model operators shall:
1. Utilize an open protocol;
2. Facilitate and maintain continuous, real-time data sharing through an interoperability interface that is based on reasonable terms that do not discriminate between third parties designated by the user;
3. Establish reasonable and proportionate thresholds related to the frequency, nature, and volume of requests, where one such threshold may include a reasonable fee to be charged for such access;
4. Adopt an accessible and conspicuous method for a user to give consent for data sharing through the interoperability interface; and
5. Disclose complete, accurate, and regularly updated information describing access to the interoperability interface as required by this section.
D. A social media platform is not required to:
1. Provide access to (i) inferences, analyses, or derived data that the social media platform has generated internally about a user or (ii) trade secrets, proprietary algorithms, ranking systems, or other internal operating mechanisms; or
2. Transmit data (i) that is stored or structured in a proprietary format; (ii) where no open, industry-standard format is reasonably available; and (iii) where transmitting the data would disclose proprietary information.
E. No controller or processor shall collect, use, or share data obtained through the interoperability interface except for purposes of safeguarding the privacy and security of such data, delivering the services requested by the user, or maintaining interoperability of services.
F. A controller or processor that receives data shared by a user through an interoperability interface shall reasonably secure any such data.
2. That the provisions of this act shall become effective on July 1, 2027.