New York Consumer Privacy Law

Which privacy laws apply to your business in New York?

New York has no comprehensive consumer-privacy statute, but it is far from unregulated — the state runs a layered, sector-by-sector framework with unusually broad practical reach. The SHIELD Act supplies the spine: any person or business that owns or licenses computerized data including the private information of a New York resident must develop, implement, and maintain reasonable safeguards to protect it , and must notify affected residents of a data breach in the most expedient time possible, with a hard outer limit of thirty days after discovery . Since June 20, 2025, the Child Data Protection Act has barred operators of websites, apps, and connected devices from processing the personal data of New York users under 18 except on narrow statutory terms . And on the employment side, Labor Law § 203-d restricts what an employer may do with employee personal identifying information .

The structural point to absorb first is that the SHIELD Act's safeguards duty carries no in-state-presence, revenue, or data-volume threshold — it turns solely on holding a New York resident's private information — so a business with a handful of New York customers or employees is covered even if it has never set foot in the state. What New York does not have is an omnibus law of the California, Virginia, or Colorado type: residents hold no general state-law rights to access, delete, or correct their personal data, and no general right to opt out of its sale (the under-18 sale ban in the Child Data Protection Act is the exception). General Business Law § 349 supplies the UDAAP and deception rule and the SHIELD safeguards enforcement hook, but breach-notice violations, Child Data Protection Act violations, and employee personal-identifying-information violations run through their own statutory enforcement provisions. The federal overlay fills the remaining lanes: FTC Act § 5 polices deceptive or unfair privacy practices nationwide, GLBA governs financial institutions, HIPAA governs covered health entities and their business associates, and COPPA governs services directed to children under 13.

The landscape is also moving. A Health Information Privacy Act passed both houses in 2025 but was vetoed in December 2025; revised S9269/A10357 passed both houses on June 3-4, 2026 and would create the health-data regime if signed. Until signature, veto, or chapter amendment, it is not in force. The separate comprehensive New York Privacy Act lineage has not advanced in 2026, so New York remains a non-comprehensive state for now — but businesses handling health-adjacent consumer data should confirm the health bill's status before relying on the current sectoral-only picture.

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A.1 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(a)

The SHIELD Act requires any person or business that owns or licenses computerized data including the private information of a New York resident to develop, implement, and maintain reasonable safeguards — with no in-state-presence, revenue, or volume threshold.

Any person or business that owns or licenses computerized data which includes private information of a resident of New York shall develop, implement and maintain reasonable safeguards to protect the security, confidentiality and integrity of the private information including, but not limited to, disposal of data.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(a).

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A.2 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(2)

Breach notice to affected New York residents must be made in the most expedient time possible and without unreasonable delay, and in no event more than thirty days after the breach is discovered, subject only to law-enforcement needs.

The disclosure shall be made in the most expedient time possible and without unreasonable delay, provided that such notification shall be made within thirty days after the breach has been discovered, except for the legitimate needs of law enforcement, as provided in subdivision four of this section.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(2).

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A.3 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(1)

The Child Data Protection Act bars an operator from processing — or letting a processor or third-party operator collect — a covered user's personal data unless a COPPA, strict-necessity, or informed-consent pathway applies.

Except as provided for in subdivision six of this section and section eight hundred ninety-nine-jj of this article, an operator shall not process, or allow a processor to process, the personal data of a covered user collected through the use of a website, online service, online application, mobile application, or connected device, or allow a third-party operator to collect the personal data of a covered user collected through the operator's website, online service, online application, mobile application, or connected device unless and to the extent: (a) the covered user is twelve years of age or younger and processing is permitted under 15 U.S.C. § 6502 and its implementing regulations; or (b) the covered user is thirteen years of age or older and processing is strictly necessary for an activity set forth in subdivision two of this section, or informed consent has been obtained as set forth in subdivision three of this section.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(1).

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A.4 N.Y. Lab. Law § 203-d

New York employers may not publicly post Social Security numbers, print them on badges or time cards, leave them in unrestricted files, or communicate employee personal identifying information to the general public.

An employer shall not unless otherwise required by law: (a) Publicly post or display an employee's social security number; (b) Visibly print a social security number on any identification badge or card, including any time card; (c) Place a social security number in files with unrestricted access; or (d) Communicate an employee's personal identifying information to the general public.

See N.Y. Lab. Law § 203-d(1).

What does the SHIELD Act require your data-security program to include?

The SHIELD Act gives a business two ways to satisfy its reasonable-safeguards duty: be a compliant regulated entity under an enumerated regime (GLBA, HIPAA/HITECH, New York's financial-services cybersecurity regulation, or other federal or state data-security rules), or implement a data-security program with the statute's enumerated administrative safeguards , technical safeguards , and physical safeguards . Small businesses — fewer than fifty employees, under three million dollars in gross annual revenue in each of the last three fiscal years, or under five million dollars in year-end total assets — comply with a program whose safeguards are appropriate to their size, complexity, activities, and the sensitivity of the data they hold .

This is the closest thing New York has to a general privacy-program mandate, and it is the prong most businesses should build to first. The statutory safeguard lists work as a program checklist: administrative safeguards (coordinator, risk identification, sufficiency assessment, training, vendor selection and contracting, program adjustment), technical safeguards (risk assessment in network and software design and in processing, transmission, and storage; attack detection, prevention, and response; testing and monitoring of key controls), and physical safeguards (storage and disposal risk, intrusion detection and response, protection during collection, transport, and destruction, and timely disposal by erasing media so the information cannot be read or reconstructed). The deemed-compliance path matters for regulated entities: a business already subject to and in compliance with GLBA, HIPAA, or the Department of Financial Services cybersecurity regulation does not need a second, parallel program for SHIELD purposes. The small-business proviso scales the duty but does not waive it — a five-person shop should be able to document a reasoned set of safeguards.

A safeguards failure is deemed a General Business Law § 349 violation, and the Attorney General may sue to enjoin violations and collect civil penalties — up to five thousand dollars per violation under the companion penalty section . Per-violation math across a large data set is what turns a paper duty into a board-level number.

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B.1 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(b)

A business is deemed compliant with the safeguards duty if it is a compliant regulated entity or implements a data-security program with the statute's enumerated administrative safeguards — coordinator, risk identification, sufficiency assessment, training, service-provider contracts, and program adjustment.

A person or business shall be deemed to be in compliance with paragraph (a) of this subdivision if it either: (i) is a compliant regulated entity as defined in subdivision one of this section; or (ii) implements a data security program that includes the following: (A) reasonable administrative safeguards such as the following, in which the person or business: (1) designates one or more employees to coordinate the security program; (2) identifies reasonably foreseeable internal and external risks; (3) assesses the sufficiency of safeguards in place to control the identified risks; (4) trains and manages employees in the security program practices and procedures; (5) selects service providers capable of maintaining appropriate safeguards, and requires those safeguards by contract; and (6) adjusts the security program in light of business changes or new circumstances

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(b).

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B.2 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(b)(ii)(B)

A SHIELD-compliant data-security program includes technical safeguards covering network and software design, information processing, transmission, storage, attack and system-failure response, and testing and monitoring.

reasonable technical safeguards such as the following, in which the person or business: (1) assesses risks in network and software design; (2) assesses risks in information processing, transmission and storage; (3) detects, prevents and responds to attacks or system failures; and (4) regularly tests and monitors the effectiveness of key controls, systems and procedures

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(b)(ii)(B).

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B.3 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(b)(ii)(C)

A SHIELD-compliant data-security program includes physical safeguards covering storage and disposal risk, intrusion response, protection during collection, transport, and destruction, and timely secure disposal.

reasonable physical safeguards such as the following, in which the person or business: (1) assesses risks of information storage and disposal; (2) detects, prevents and responds to intrusions; (3) protects against unauthorized access to or use of private information during or after the collection, transportation and destruction or disposal of the information; and (4) disposes of private information within a reasonable amount of time after it is no longer needed for business purposes by erasing electronic media so that the information cannot be read or reconstructed.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(b)(ii)(C).

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B.4 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(1)(c)

A small business under the SHIELD Act is one with fewer than fifty employees, less than $3 million in gross annual revenue in each of the last three fiscal years, or less than $5 million in year-end total assets.

"Small business" shall mean any person or business with (i) fewer than fifty employees; (ii) less than three million dollars in gross annual revenue in each of the last three fiscal years; or (iii) less than five million dollars in year-end total assets, calculated in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(1)(c).

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B.5 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(c)

A small business complies if its security program contains reasonable administrative, technical, and physical safeguards appropriate to its size, complexity, activities, and the sensitivity of the personal information it collects.

A small business as defined in paragraph (c) of subdivision one of this section complies with subparagraph (ii) of paragraph (b) of subdivision two of this section if the small business's security program contains reasonable administrative, technical and physical safeguards that are appropriate for the size and complexity of the small business, the nature and scope of the small business's activities, and the sensitivity of the personal information the small business collects from or about consumers.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(c).

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B.6 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(d)

A failure to comply with the safeguards duty is deemed a violation of GBL § 349, and the Attorney General may sue to enjoin violations and obtain civil penalties under GBL § 350-d.

Any person or business that fails to comply with this subdivision shall be deemed to have violated section three hundred forty-nine of this chapter, and the attorney general may bring an action in the name and on behalf of the people of the state of New York to enjoin such violations and to obtain civil penalties under section three hundred fifty-d of this chapter.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(d).

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B.7 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 350-d

The civil penalty for an act or practice unlawful under GBL article 22-A — the hook through which safeguards failures are penalized — is up to $5,000 per violation, recoverable by the Attorney General.

Any person, firm, corporation or association or agent or employee thereof who engages in any of the acts or practices stated in this article to be unlawful shall be liable to a civil penalty of not more than five thousand dollars for each violation, which shall accrue to the state of New York and may be recovered in a civil action brought by the attorney general.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 350-d(a).

What must your New York privacy policy contain?

No New York statute requires a general consumer privacy policy or fixes what it must say. The governing rule is instead that whatever you publish has to be true: General Business Law § 349 declares unfair, deceptive, or abusive acts and practices in any business, trade, or commerce in the state unlawful , and FTC Act § 5 reaches the same conduct federally — so a privacy policy that misstates how you collect, use, share, retain, or secure data is itself the violation. Where a sectoral regime applies, that regime supplies the required contents; a HIPAA covered entity, for example, must give individuals notice of the uses and disclosures of their protected health information and of their rights and the entity's duties .

In practice the drafting question for a New York-facing policy is less what must be included than does the policy match actual practice. Build the contents from the overlay that applies to you — GLBA privacy notices for financial institutions, the HIPAA Notice of Privacy Practices for covered entities, HIPAA business-associate agreements where a business associate handles PHI, and a COPPA notice for services directed to children under 13 — and, for everyone else, follow best practice: describe the categories of data collected, the purposes, the third parties you share with, and how users exercise any choices you offer, then honor every word of it. Two New York-specific notes sharpen the risk. First, § 349 was amended effective February 17, 2026 to reach unfair and abusive practices, not just deceptive ones, so the Attorney General can now pursue data practices that involve no affirmative misstatement at all — think onerous consent flows or data uses a consumer cannot reasonably avoid. Second, because § 349 carries a private right of action for deceptive practices (covered in the lawsuit section below), an inaccurate privacy policy is one of the few privacy failures in New York that consumers themselves can sue over.

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C.1 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 349(a)

GBL § 349 declares unfair, deceptive, or abusive acts or practices in the conduct of any business, trade, or commerce in New York unlawful — which reaches a privacy policy that misstates a business's actual data practices.

Unfair, deceptive, or abusive acts or practices in the conduct of any business, trade or commerce or in the furnishing of any service in this state are hereby declared unlawful.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 349(a).

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C.2 FTC Act § 5

Section 5 of the FTC Act declares unfair or deceptive acts or practices in or affecting commerce unlawful, which independently reaches privacy-policy misstatements by businesses serving New Yorkers.

Unfair methods of competition in or affecting commerce, and unfair or deceptive acts or practices in or affecting commerce, are hereby declared unlawful.

See 15 U.S.C. § 45(a)(1).

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C.3 HIPAA Notice of Privacy Practices

A HIPAA covered entity must give individuals a notice describing the uses and disclosures of their protected health information and their rights and the entity's legal duties.

an individual has a right to adequate notice of the uses and disclosures of protected health information that may be made by the covered entity, and of the individual's rights and the covered entity's legal duties with respect to protected health information

See 45 C.F.R. § 164.520(a)(1).

Can you collect personal data from users under 18 in New York?

Only on the statute's terms. Since June 20, 2025, New York's Child Data Protection Act has flipped the default for minors' data: subject to the statute's express subdivision-six deletion/transition rule and § 899-jj exception, an operator may not process — or let a processor or third-party operator collect — the personal data of a covered user unless, for users 12 or younger, COPPA permits the processing, or, for users 13 through 17, the processing is strictly necessary for an enumerated activity or the user has given informed consent . A covered user is a New York user the operator actually knows to be a minor, or any user of a service primarily directed to minors , and a minor is anyone under eighteen . Selling a covered user's personal data is prohibited except as provided in § 899-jj .

The strictly-necessary lane is narrow by design: it covers providing a service the user requested, internal operations (expressly excluding marketing, advertising, research and development, and re-engagement prompts), fixing technical errors, fraud and security, legal compliance and claims, and vital interests. Everything else for the 13-to-17 band requires informed consent collected the statute's way — the request must be separate from other transactions, free of interface design that obscures or impairs the choice, must state clearly that the processing is not strictly necessary and can be declined without losing the service, and must present refusal as the most prominent option ; consent is freely revocable, and a declined or revoked request cannot be repeated for the following calendar year . Operators also may not punish a non-consenting user by degrading or charging more for the service , must delete a covered user's non-permitted data within thirty days of learning the user is covered , and must honor device-level decline signals .

Enforcement belongs to the Attorney General, who may sue any person within or outside the state for injunctions, restitution, disgorgement — including destruction of unlawfully obtained data — damages, and civil penalties of up to five thousand dollars per violation . The Attorney General published implementation guidance in 2025 signaling enforcement discretion for good-faith compliance while formal rules under the act remain outstanding, but the statute itself is in force and per-violation exposure across a youth user base scales quickly. Note the act's relationship to federal law: for under-13 users it harmonizes with COPPA rather than displacing it, so a COPPA-compliant program is the starting point, not the finish line, for a New York audience that includes teenagers.

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D.1 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(1)

Subject to subdivision six and § 899-jj, the Child Data Protection Act prohibits processing a covered user's personal data unless COPPA permits it (12 and under) or the processing is strictly necessary or done with informed consent (13 and older).

Except as provided for in subdivision six of this section and section eight hundred ninety-nine-jj of this article, an operator shall not process, or allow a processor to process, the personal data of a covered user collected through the use of a website, online service, online application, mobile application, or connected device, or allow a third-party operator to collect the personal data of a covered user collected through the operator's website, online service, online application, mobile application, or connected device unless and to the extent: (a) the covered user is twelve years of age or younger and processing is permitted under 15 U.S.C. § 6502 and its implementing regulations; or (b) the covered user is thirteen years of age or older and processing is strictly necessary for an activity set forth in subdivision two of this section, or informed consent has been obtained as set forth in subdivision three of this section.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(1).

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D.2 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ee(1)

A covered user is a New York user of a website, online service, app, or connected device whom the operator actually knows to be a minor, or any user of a service primarily directed to minors.

"Covered user" shall mean a user of a website, online service, online application, mobile application, or connected device, or portion thereof, in the state of New York who is: (a) actually known by the operator of such website, online service, online application, mobile application, or connected device to be a minor; or (b) using a website, online service, online application, mobile application, or connected device primarily directed to minors.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ee(1).

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D.3 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ee(2)

A minor under the Child Data Protection Act is a natural person under the age of eighteen — the act protects teenagers, not just children under 13.

"Minor" shall mean a natural person under the age of eighteen.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ee(2).

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D.4 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(5)

Except as provided in § 899-jj, an operator may not purchase or sell a covered user's personal data, or allow a processor or third-party operator to do so.

Except as provided for in section eight hundred ninety-nine-jj of this article, an operator shall not purchase or sell, or allow a processor or third-party operator to purchase or sell, the personal data of a covered user.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(5).

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D.6 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(3)(b)-(c)

Informed consent must be freely revocable and at least as easy to revoke as to provide, and after a covered user declines or revokes consent the operator may not request that processing again for the following calendar year.

Such informed consent, once given, shall be freely revocable at any time, and shall be at least as easy to revoke as it was to provide. (c) If a covered user declines to provide or revokes informed consent for processing, another request may not be made for such processing for the following calendar year, however an operator may make available a mechanism that a covered user can use unprompted and at the user's discretion to provide informed consent.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(3)(b)-(c).

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D.9 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(3)(d)

If a covered user's device communicates or signals that the user declines informed consent for processing, the operator may not request informed consent for that processing.

If a covered user's device communicates or signals that the covered user declines to provide informed consent for processing pursuant to the provisions of subdivision two of section eight hundred ninety-nine-ii of this article, an operator shall not request informed consent for such processing, however an operator may make available a mechanism that a covered user can use unprompted and at the user's discretion to provide informed consent.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(3)(d).

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D.7 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(4)

Except where processing is strictly necessary to provide a product, service, or feature, an operator may not withhold, degrade, lower quality, or increase price because consent was not obtained.

Except where processing is strictly necessary to provide a product, service, or feature, an operator may not withhold, degrade, lower the quality, or increase the price of any product, service, or feature to a covered user due to the operator not obtaining verifiable parental consent under 15 U.S.C. § 6502 and its implementing regulations or informed consent under subdivision three of this section.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(4).

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D.8 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(6)

Within thirty days of determining or being informed that a user is covered, the operator must delete and direct processors to delete the covered user's personal data unless COPPA, strict necessity, or informed consent permits continued processing.

Within thirty days of determining or being informed that a user is a covered user, an operator shall: (a) dispose of, destroy, or delete and direct all of its processors to dispose of, destroy, or delete all personal data of such covered user that it maintains, unless processing such personal data is permitted under 15 U.S.C. § 6502 and its implementing regulations, is strictly necessary for an activity listed in subdivision two of this section, or informed consent is obtained as set forth in subdivision three of this section

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(6).

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D.10 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-mm

The Attorney General enforces the Child Data Protection Act through actions for injunctions, restitution, disgorgement (including destruction of unlawfully obtained data), damages, and civil penalties of up to $5,000 per violation.

Whenever it appears to the attorney general, either upon complaint or otherwise, that any person, within or outside the state, has engaged in or is about to engage in any of the acts or practices stated to be unlawful in this article, the attorney general may bring an action or special proceeding in the name and on behalf of the people of the state of New York to enjoin any violation of this article, to obtain restitution of any moneys or property obtained directly or indirectly by any such violation, to obtain disgorgement of any profits or gains obtained directly or indirectly by any such violation, including but not limited to the destruction of unlawfully obtained data, to obtain damages caused directly or indirectly by any such violation, to obtain civil penalties of up to five thousand dollars per violation, and to obtain any such other and further relief as the court may deem proper, including preliminary relief.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-mm.

What privacy rights and opt-outs do New York consumers have?

New York does not give adult consumers a general state-law right to access, delete, correct, or port personal data, a general sale opt-out, or a general universal-opt-out-signal right. The state-specific choice regime is targeted to covered users under 18: for users 13 through 17, processing that is not strictly necessary requires informed consent collected through the CDPA's prescribed request or device-signal path , and the sale of covered users' personal data is prohibited except as provided in § 899-jj .

For adults, the practical right is indirect: a deceptive privacy statement can support a consumer suit under General Business Law § 349(h), but that is a deception remedy, not an omnibus data-rights regime . For minors, the CDPA gives the meaningful opt-out architecture. Consent must be separate from other transactions, free of mechanisms that obscure or impair the user's choice, and paired with refusal as the most prominent option . Once consent is declined or revoked, the operator generally cannot ask again for that processing for the following calendar year ; if the covered user's device communicates a decline signal, the operator cannot request informed consent for that processing . New York therefore has a strong minor-specific consent and signal rule, but no across-the-board adult universal-opt-out requirement.

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E.2 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(5)

Except as provided in § 899-jj, an operator may not purchase or sell a covered user's personal data, or allow a processor or third-party operator to do so.

Except as provided for in section eight hundred ninety-nine-jj of this article, an operator shall not purchase or sell, or allow a processor or third-party operator to purchase or sell, the personal data of a covered user.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(5).

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E.4 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(3)(b)-(c)

Such informed consent, once given, shall be freely revocable at any time, and shall be at least as easy to revoke as it was to provide. (c) If a covered user declines to provide or revokes informed consent for processing, another request may not be made for such processing for the following calendar year, however an operator may make available a mechanism that a covered user can use unprompted and at the user's discretion to provide informed consent.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(3)(b)-(c).

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E.5 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(3)(d)

If a covered user's device communicates or signals that the user declines informed consent for processing, the operator may not request informed consent for that processing.

If a covered user's device communicates or signals that the covered user declines to provide informed consent for processing pursuant to the provisions of subdivision two of section eight hundred ninety-nine-ii of this article, an operator shall not request informed consent for such processing, however an operator may make available a mechanism that a covered user can use unprompted and at the user's discretion to provide informed consent.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-ff(3)(d).

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E.3 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 349(h)

GBL § 349(h) gives an injured person a private action for deceptive acts or practices, including actual damages or $50, possible treble damages up to $1,000, and attorney's fees.

In addition to the right of action granted to the attorney general pursuant to this section, any person who has been injured by reason of any deceptive act or deceptive practice made unlawful by this section may bring an action in such person's own name to enjoin such deceptive act or deceptive practice, an action to recover such person's actual damages or fifty dollars, whichever is greater, or both such actions. The court may, in its discretion, increase the award of damages to an amount not to exceed three times the actual damages up to one thousand dollars, if the court finds the defendant willfully or knowingly violated this section. The court may award reasonable attorney's fees to a prevailing plaintiff.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 349(h).

What must your contracts with vendors say?

New York has no omnibus data-processing-agreement statute, but two state-law contract duties do exist. Under the SHIELD Act, a compliant security program includes selecting service providers capable of maintaining appropriate safeguards and requiring those safeguards by contract . And under the Child Data Protection Act, no operator or processor may disclose a covered user's personal data to a third party — or allow a third party to process it — without a written, binding agreement setting out processing instructions and the parties' rights and obligations .

For general adult-consumer data, the SHIELD clause is the floor: a New York-facing business should be able to show that its vendor diligence and its contracts impose safeguards on everyone who touches private information, because a vendor-caused breach will be evaluated against that statutory element. Where minors' data is in scope, the Child Data Protection Act turns the contract into a gating requirement — the statute also obliges processors to follow the operator's instructions, to assist with the operator's deletion duties, to demonstrate compliance on request, to cooperate with assessments, and to give advance notice before handing data to further processors, so a compliant agreement should track each of those elements. The federal overlay supplies the rest where it applies: the GLBA Safeguards Rule requires financial institutions to bind service providers by contract to implement and maintain safeguards , and HIPAA requires a business-associate agreement with mandatory data-protection, breach-reporting, and subcontractor flow-down terms before protected health information changes hands . Outside those lanes, carrying the same terms forward — documented instructions, confidentiality, reasonable security, breach notice back to you, return or deletion at the end of the engagement — is best practice that also evidences SHIELD compliance.

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F.1 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(b)(ii)(A)(5)

A SHIELD-compliant security program includes selecting service providers capable of maintaining appropriate safeguards and requiring those safeguards by contract.

selects service providers capable of maintaining appropriate safeguards, and requires those safeguards by contract

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(b)(ii)(A)(5).

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F.2 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-gg(1)

No operator or processor may disclose a covered user's personal data to a third party, or allow a third party to process it, without a written, binding agreement setting out processing and disclosure instructions and the parties' rights and obligations.

Except as provided for in section eight hundred ninety-nine-jj of this article, no operator or processor shall disclose the personal data of a covered user to a third party, or allow the processing of the personal data of a covered user by a third party, without a written, binding agreement governing such disclosure or processing. Such agreement shall clearly set forth instructions for the nature and purpose of the processor's processing of the personal data, instructions for using or further disclosing the personal data, and the rights and obligations of both parties.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-gg(1).

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F.3 GLBA Safeguards Rule

The GLBA Safeguards Rule requires a financial institution to oversee its service providers, including by requiring them by contract to implement and maintain appropriate safeguards for customer information.

Requiring your service providers by contract to implement and maintain such safeguards

See 16 C.F.R. § 314.4(f)(2).

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F.4 HIPAA Business Associate Contracts

HIPAA requires a business-associate contract to establish permitted uses and disclosures of protected health information and bind the business associate to safeguards, breach reporting, and subcontractor flow-down restrictions.

A contract between the covered entity and a business associate must: (i) Establish the permitted and required uses and disclosures of protected health information by the business associate. The contract may not authorize the business associate to use or further disclose the information in a manner that would violate the requirements of this subpart, if done by the covered entity, except that: (A) The contract may permit the business associate to use and disclose protected health information for the proper management and administration of the business associate, as provided in paragraph (e)(4) of this section; and (B) The contract may permit the business associate to provide data aggregation services relating to the health care operations of the covered entity. (ii) Provide that the business associate will: (A) Not use or further disclose the information other than as permitted or required by the contract or as required by law; (B) Use appropriate safeguards and comply, where applicable, with subpart C of this part with respect to electronic protected health information, to prevent use or disclosure of the information other than as provided for by its contract; (C) Report to the covered entity any use or disclosure of the information not provided for by its contract of which it becomes aware, including breaches of unsecured protected health information as required by § 164.410; (D) In accordance with § 164.502(e)(1)(ii), ensure that any subcontractors that create, receive, maintain, or transmit protected health information on behalf of the business associate agree to the same restrictions and conditions that apply to the business associate with respect to such information

See 45 C.F.R. § 164.504(e).

When must you notify people of a data breach in New York?

Any person or business that owns or licenses computerized data including private information must notify every New York resident whose private information was, or is reasonably believed to have been, accessed or acquired without valid authorization — in the most expedient time possible, and in any event within thirty days after the breach is discovered . The trigger is broad: a breach includes unauthorized access to private information, not just its acquisition . And whenever any New York residents are notified, the business must also notify the Attorney General, the Department of State, the State Police, and — for covered financial-services entities — the Department of Financial Services .

What counts as private information drives the analysis. It means personal information combined with an unencrypted (or key-compromised) data element — Social Security number, driver's license or non-driver ID number, financial-account or card numbers that permit account access, biometric information, medical information, and health-insurance information — or a username or email address combined with a password or security credentials permitting access to an online account . The medical and health-insurance additions matter operationally: incident-response playbooks written before 2025 often classify those elements as non-triggering, and in New York they now trigger. A business that merely maintains data it does not own must alert the data's owner within thirty days of discovery , and notice to individuals may be written, electronic with express consent, telephonic with a log, or by substitute notice for very large or unreachable classes . A narrow carve-out excuses notice for inadvertent disclosures by authorized persons that the business reasonably determines are unlikely to cause misuse or harm — but the determination must be documented in writing, retained for five years, and, if more than five hundred residents are affected, provided to the Attorney General within ten days . When more than five thousand residents are notified at once, the consumer reporting agencies must be notified as well .

Non-compliance is an Attorney General matter: in the Attorney General's action, the court may award damages for actual losses of persons entitled to notice , and for knowing or reckless violations may impose a civil penalty of the greater of five thousand dollars or up to twenty dollars per failed notification, capped at two hundred fifty thousand dollars . A late-notice case needs no underlying security failure, so the thirty-day clock deserves a hard-coded place in any incident-response plan. Businesses already notifying under GLBA, HIPAA/HITECH, or the Department of Financial Services cybersecurity regulation need not send duplicate individual notices, but the New York regulator and credit-agency notices still apply, and HIPAA-covered entities reporting a breach to federal health authorities must copy the New York Attorney General within five business days .

Sources for this answer

Primary law

G.1 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(2)

A business owning or licensing computerized private information must notify affected New York residents of a breach in the most expedient time possible and without unreasonable delay, and no later than thirty days after discovery.

Any person or business which owns or licenses computerized data which includes private information shall disclose any breach of the security of the system following discovery or notification of the breach in the security of the system to any resident of New York state whose private information was, or is reasonably believed to have been, accessed or acquired by a person without valid authorization. The disclosure shall be made in the most expedient time possible and without unreasonable delay, provided that such notification shall be made within thirty days after the breach has been discovered, except for the legitimate needs of law enforcement, as provided in subdivision four of this section.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(2).

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G.2 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(1)(c)

A breach of the security of the system includes unauthorized access to private information, not just its acquisition.

"Breach of the security of the system" shall mean unauthorized access to or acquisition of, or access to or acquisition without valid authorization, of computerized data that compromises the security, confidentiality, or integrity of private information maintained by a business.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(1)(c).

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G.4 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(1)(b)

Private information includes Social Security, driver's license, financial-account, biometric, medical-information, and health-insurance-information data elements, plus online credentials.

(1) social security number; (2) driver's license number or non-driver identification card number; (3) account number, credit or debit card number, in combination with any required security code, access code, password or other information that would permit access to an individual's financial account; (4) account number, credit or debit card number, if circumstances exist wherein such number could be used to access an individual's financial account without additional identifying information, security code, access code, or password; or (5) biometric information, meaning data generated by electronic measurements of an individual's unique physical characteristics, such as a fingerprint, voice print, retina or iris image, or other unique physical representation or digital representation of biometric data which are used to authenticate or ascertain the individual's identity; or (6) medical information, meaning any information regarding an individual's medical history, mental or physical condition, or medical treatment or diagnosis by a health care professional; or (7) health insurance information, meaning an individual's health insurance policy number or subscriber identification number, any unique identifier used by a health insurer to identify the individual or any information in an individual's application and claims history, including but not limited to, appeals history; or (ii) a user name or e-mail address in combination with a password or security question and answer that would permit access to an online account.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(1)(b).

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G.5 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(3)

A person or business that maintains computerized private information it does not own must notify the owner or licensee immediately, and no later than thirty days after discovery, if the private information was or is reasonably believed to have been accessed or acquired without valid authorization.

Any person or business which maintains computerized data which includes private information which such person or business does not own shall notify the owner or licensee of the information of any breach of the security of the system immediately, provided that such notification shall be made within thirty days following discovery, if the private information was, or is reasonably believed to have been, accessed or acquired by a person without valid authorization.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(3).

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G.6 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(5)

Breach notice to affected persons may be written, electronic with express consent and a log, telephone with a log, or substitute notice if the statutory cost, class-size, or contact-information conditions are met.

The notice required by this section shall be directly provided to the affected persons by one of the following methods: (a) written notice; (b) electronic notice, provided that the person to whom notice is required has expressly consented to receiving said notice in electronic form and a log of each such notification is kept by the person or business who notifies affected persons in such form; provided further, however, that in no case shall any person or business require a person to consent to accepting said notice in said form as a condition of establishing any business relationship or engaging in any transaction. (c) telephone notification provided that a log of each such notification is kept by the person or business who notifies affected persons; or (d) substitute notice, if a business demonstrates to the state attorney general that the cost of providing notice would exceed two hundred fifty thousand dollars, or that the affected class of subject persons to be notified exceeds five hundred thousand, or such business does not have sufficient contact information.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(5).

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G.7 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(2)(a)

Notice is not required for an inadvertent disclosure by authorized persons if the business reasonably determines the exposure is unlikely to result in misuse, financial harm, or online-credential emotional harm, documents that determination for at least five years, and submits it to the Attorney General within ten days if more than 500 residents are affected.

Notice to affected persons under this section is not required if the exposure of private information was an inadvertent disclosure by persons authorized to access private information, and the person or business reasonably determines such exposure will not likely result in misuse of such information, or financial harm to the affected persons or emotional harm in the case of unknown disclosure of online credentials as found in subparagraph (ii) of paragraph (b) of subdivision one of this section. Such a determination must be documented in writing and maintained for at least five years. If the incident affects over five hundred residents of New York, the person or business shall provide the written determination to the state attorney general within ten days after the determination.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(2)(a).

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G.3 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(8)(a)

Whenever New York residents are notified of a breach, the business must also notify the Attorney General, the Department of State, the State Police, and (for covered entities under 23 NYCRR 500.1) the Department of Financial Services, with a copy of the notice template.

In the event that any New York residents are to be notified, the person or business shall notify the state attorney general, the department of state, the division of state police, and the department of financial services as to the timing, content and distribution of the notices and approximate number of affected persons and shall provide a copy of the template of the notice sent to affected persons

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(8)(a).

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G.8 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(8)(b)

If more than 5,000 New York residents are notified at one time, the business must also notify the consumer reporting agencies of the timing, content, and distribution of the notices.

In the event that more than five thousand New York residents are to be notified at one time, the person or business shall also notify consumer reporting agencies as to the timing, content and distribution of the notices and approximate number of affected persons.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(8)(b).

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G.9 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(6)(a)

In an Attorney General action for breach-notice violations, the court may award damages for actual costs or losses, including consequential financial losses, incurred by persons entitled to notice who did not receive it.

In such action the court may award damages for actual costs or losses incurred by a person entitled to notice pursuant to this article, if notification was not provided to such person pursuant to this article, including consequential financial losses.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(6)(a).

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G.10 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(6)(a)

For knowing or reckless notification failures, the court may impose a civil penalty of the greater of $5,000 or up to $20 per instance of failed notification, capped at $250,000.

Whenever the court shall determine in such action that a person or business violated this article knowingly or recklessly, the court may impose a civil penalty of the greater of five thousand dollars or up to twenty dollars per instance of failed notification, provided that the latter amount shall not exceed two hundred fifty thousand dollars.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(6)(a).

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G.11 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(9)

A covered entity that must notify HHS of a HIPAA/HITECH breach must provide that notification to the New York Attorney General within five business days of notifying HHS.

Any covered entity required to provide notification of a breach, including breach of information that is not "private information" as defined in paragraph (b) of subdivision one of this section, to the secretary of health and human services pursuant to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 or the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act, as amended from time to time, shall provide such notification to the state attorney general within five business days of notifying the secretary.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(9).

Can a consumer sue your business in New York over privacy?

Not under the SHIELD Act. The safeguards section says expressly that nothing in it creates a private right of action , and the breach-notification statute routes consumer redress through the Attorney General — in the Attorney General's action, the court may award damages for actual costs or losses of people who should have been notified but were not . The consumer's own door is General Business Law § 349(h): any person injured by a deceptive act or practice may sue in their own name for actual damages or fifty dollars, whichever is greater, with discretionary treble damages up to one thousand dollars for willful or knowing violations and attorney's fees for a prevailing plaintiff .

The practical consequence is that New York privacy litigation by consumers is framed as deception, not as a statutory data-rights claim: a privacy policy or security promise that did not match reality is the classic § 349(h) theory, often pleaded alongside common-law negligence and implied-contract claims after a breach. Two limits keep that exposure bounded. The § 349(h) action reaches deceptive acts and practices — the statute's newer unfair and abusive prongs are the Attorney General's to enforce — and the modest statutory minimum means individual claims aggregate into class actions rather than standing alone. On the public side, the Attorney General is an active privacy enforcer, using the SHIELD safeguards hook, the breach statute, and § 349 directly, typically resolving matters by assurance of discontinuance with monetary payments and mandated security programs; the auto-insurer and notice-timing settlements described in the security-program and breach sections above show the pattern. Employee data has its own enforcement lane: the Commissioner of Labor may impose a civil penalty of up to five hundred dollars for a knowing violation of the employee personal-identifying-information rules, and a violation is presumed knowing if the employer has no safeguard policies in place — which makes a short written policy the cheapest compliance step in this entire note .

One forward-looking caveat belongs here. Revised S9269/A10357 passed both houses on June 3-4, 2026 and would create a Health Information Privacy Act if signed; until signature, veto, or chapter amendment, it is not in force. In its passed form, it would keep enforcement exclusively with the Attorney General — no private right of action — at civil penalties of up to fifteen thousand dollars per violation.

Sources for this answer

Primary law

H.1 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(e)

The SHIELD Act's data-security section expressly creates no private right of action.

Nothing in this section shall create a private right of action.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-bb(2)(e).

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H.2 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(6)(a)

Consumer redress for notification failures runs through the Attorney General's action, in which the court may award damages for actual costs or losses — including consequential financial losses — of persons entitled to notice who did not receive it.

whenever the attorney general shall believe from evidence satisfactory to him or her that there is a violation of this article he or she may bring an action in the name and on behalf of the people of the state of New York, in a court of justice having jurisdiction to issue an injunction, to enjoin and restrain the continuation of such violation. In such action, preliminary relief may be granted under article sixty-three of the civil practice law and rules. In such action the court may award damages for actual costs or losses incurred by a person entitled to notice pursuant to this article, if notification was not provided to such person pursuant to this article, including consequential financial losses.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 899-aa(6)(a).

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H.3 N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 349(h)

GBL § 349(h) gives any person injured by a deceptive act or practice a private action for actual damages or $50 (whichever is greater), discretionary treble damages up to $1,000 for willful or knowing violations, and attorney's fees.

In addition to the right of action granted to the attorney general pursuant to this section, any person who has been injured by reason of any deceptive act or deceptive practice made unlawful by this section may bring an action in such person's own name to enjoin such deceptive act or deceptive practice, an action to recover such person's actual damages or fifty dollars, whichever is greater, or both such actions. The court may, in its discretion, increase the award of damages to an amount not to exceed three times the actual damages up to one thousand dollars, if the court finds the defendant willfully or knowingly violated this section. The court may award reasonable attorney's fees to a prevailing plaintiff.

See N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 349(h).

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H.4 N.Y. Lab. Law § 203-d(3)

The Commissioner of Labor may impose a civil penalty of up to $500 for a knowing violation of the employee personal-identifying-information rules, and a violation is presumptively knowing if the employer has no safeguard policies or procedures.

The commissioner may impose a civil penalty of up to five hundred dollars on any employer for any knowing violation of this section. It shall be presumptive evidence that a violation of this section was knowing if the employer has not put in place any policies or procedures to safeguard against such violation, including procedures to notify relevant employees of these provisions.

See N.Y. Lab. Law § 203-d(3).