Data Care Act of 2025
Sponsored By: Senator Schatz, Brian [D-HI]
Introduced
Summary
Creates clear duties for online service providers to protect and limit use of end-user data. This bill would define what counts as sensitive data and require online services to follow duties of care, loyalty, and confidentiality, including stronger breach-notification authority.
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- Families and end users: Would get clearer protections for sensitive categories like social security numbers, health information, biometrics, account access data, and nonpublic communications, plus prompt notice when sensitive data is breached.
- Online service providers: Would face legal duties to secure data, avoid using data in ways that harm users, forbid disclosure or sale outside those duties, and ensure any third party that gets data follows the same rules. Section 3 would apply 180 days after enactment.
- State and federal enforcement: Would let the Federal Trade Commission enforce these duties as unfair or deceptive acts and let state attorneys general sue under parens patriae with civil penalties based on days of noncompliance or harmed users.
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Bill Overview
Analyzed Economic Effects
3 provisions identified: 3 benefits, 0 costs, 0 mixed.
Stronger data security and breach notices
This bill would require online services to reasonably secure your identifying data. It would require prompt notice to you when your sensitive data is breached. It would bar selling or sharing identifying data except in ways consistent with the law's duties of care and loyalty. Any recipient would need a contract imposing the same duties, and providers would have to take reasonable steps, including regular audits, to ensure recipients follow those duties. These duties would apply 180 days after enactment.
Who and what the bill would cover
This bill would define core privacy words like "end user", "online service provider", and "individual identifying data." It would define a list of "sensitive data," including Social Security numbers, children’s COPPA data, government ID numbers, bank account numbers and access codes, unique biometrics, login credentials, health records, precise location plus name, and nonpublic messages. The bill would also bar contracts from making you give up your rights or remedies under this law. It would say the bill does not change other federal or state privacy laws or the FTC's authority.
New FTC power and state penalties
This bill would let the Federal Trade Commission make rules to exempt some providers and to expand which data require breach notices. The FTC would treat violations as unfair or deceptive acts and could use its full enforcement powers, including rulemaking. State attorneys general could sue on behalf of residents, seek civil penalties, and must notify the FTC before filing. Civil penalties would be calculated by multiplying the greater of the number of days of noncompliance or the number of harmed users by a per-unit amount up to the federal maximum penalty (with inflation adjustments). The FTC could intervene in state cases, and a state could not bring a parens patriae suit while the FTC has a pending case on the same facts.
Sponsors & CoSponsors
Sponsor
Schatz, Brian [D-HI]
HI • D
Cosponsors
Sen. Merkley, Jeff [D-OR]
OR • D
Sponsored 12/18/2025
Sen. Murphy, Christopher [D-CT]
CT • D
Sponsored 12/18/2025
Sen. Baldwin, Tammy [D-WI]
WI • D
Sponsored 12/18/2025
Sen. King, Angus S., Jr. [I-ME]
ME • I
Sponsored 12/18/2025
Sen. Sanders, Bernard [I-VT]
VT • I
Sponsored 12/18/2025
Sen. Booker, Cory A. [D-NJ]
NJ • D
Sponsored 12/18/2025
Sen. Duckworth, Tammy [D-IL]
IL • D
Sponsored 12/18/2025
Sen. Smith, Tina [D-MN]
MN • D
Sponsored 12/18/2025
Sen. Durbin, Richard J. [D-IL]
IL • D
Sponsored 12/18/2025
Peter Welch
VT • D
Sponsored 12/18/2025
Sen. Warren, Elizabeth [D-MA]
MA • D
Sponsored 12/18/2025
Amy Klobuchar
MN • D
Sponsored 1/7/2026
Sen. Bennet, Michael F. [D-CO]
CO • D
Sponsored 3/20/2026
Sen. Luján, Ben Ray [D-NM]
NM • D
Sponsored 3/20/2026
Roll Call Votes
No roll call votes available for this bill.
View on Congress.gov