Bus. & Prof. Code, § 22678 · Chapter 22.8. Content Moderation Requirements for Internet Terms of Service
Bus. & Prof. Code, § 22678
Text — As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
(a) (1) A social media company that violates the provisions of this chapter shall be liable for a civil penalty not to exceed fifteen thousand dollars ($15,000) per violation per day, and may be enjoined in any court of competent jurisdiction.
(2) A social media company shall be considered in violation of the provisions of this chapter for each day the social media company does any of the following:
(A) Fails to post terms of service in accordance with Section 22676.
(B) Fails to timely submit to the Attorney General a report required pursuant to Section 22677.
(C) Materially omits or misrepresents required information in a report submitted pursuant to Section 22677.
(3) In assessing the amount of a civil penalty pursuant to paragraph (1), the court shall consider whether the social media company has made a reasonable, good faith attempt to comply with the provisions of this chapter.
(b) Actions for relief pursuant to this chapter shall be prosecuted exclusively in a court of competent jurisdiction by the Attorney General or by a city attorney of a city having a population in excess of 750,000, or by a city attorney in a city and county in the name of the people of the State of California upon their own complaint or upon the complaint of a board, officer, person, corporation, or association.
(c) If an action pursuant to this section is brought by the Attorney General, one-half of the penalty collected shall be paid to the treasurer of the county in which the judgment was entered, and one-half to the General Fund. If the action is brought by a city attorney, one-half of the penalty collected shall be paid to the treasurer of the city in which the judgment was entered, and one-half to the treasurer of the county in which the judgment was entered.
Notes and commentary — not statutory text
History
Added by Stats. 2022, Ch. 269, Sec. 2. (AB 587) Effective January 1, 2023.
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=22678.
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- 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
This section cites
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Business and Professions Code
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