Bus. & Prof. Code, § 17940 · Chapter 6. Bots
Bus. & Prof. Code, § 17940
Text — As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
For purposes of this chapter:
(a) “Bot” means an automated online account where all or substantially all of the actions or posts of that account are not the result of a person.
(b) “Online” means appearing on any public-facing Internet Web site, Web application, or digital application, including a social network or publication.
(c) “Online platform” means any public-facing Internet Web site, Web application, or digital application, including a social network or publication, that has 10,000,000 or more unique monthly United States visitors or users for a majority of months during the preceding 12 months.
(d) “Person” means a natural person, corporation, limited liability company, partnership, joint venture, association, estate, trust, government, governmental subdivision or agency, or other legal entity or any combination thereof.
Notes and commentary — not statutory text
History
Added by Stats. 2018, Ch. 892, Sec. 1. (SB 1001) Effective January 1, 2019. Operative July 1, 2019, pursuant to Section 17943.
Source of truth
- Edition
- As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
- Official file
- https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=BPC§ionNum=17940.
- Text hash
- sha256 0deba65ca2f35442ca57121f31a5bbcb5c95f50a1d9098dee4ae6d95111b71c3
- Composed by
- compose_ca.py 2026-10-22: the Legislative Counsel's CAML content files read by a tokenizer (caml_readers.reader_a); an independent xml.etree reading (caml_readers.reader_b) agrees on every section
Procedural information only. Not legal advice and not a substitute for the advice of an attorney. Confirm the current text with the official publisher before relying on it.