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Bus. & Prof. Code, § 22678 · Chapter 22.8. Content Moderation Requirements for Internet Terms of Service

Bus. & Prof. Code, § 22678

Verbatim from the official edition

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&sectionNum=22678.
Text hash
sha256 3ec888d1cd72ada34e02a8bfb90aea2f613822f0769aa6793e10d0f9f9752845
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

This section cites

Provisions in this library that the text above cites, as it prints each citation. A range cited as “ss. 61.13-61.16” links its first and last provisions.

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.