New Jersey’s new online safety law limits notifications, adult contact and data collection on minors’ accounts.
The three-law package adds default privacy rules, creates a research center and orders a study of social media warning labels.
TRENTON, NJ – Online platforms used by New Jersey children and teenagers will have to switch accounts to their highest privacy settings, restrict notifications during school and overnight hours, and limit how adults can find or contact minors under legislation signed Aug. 11.
The centerpiece is the New Jersey Age-Appropriate Design Code, part of a three-law online safety package signed by Gov. Mikie Sherrill.
The code applies to covered online services doing business in New Jersey that are reasonably likely to be accessed by minors and either earn more than $25 million in annual gross revenue or process data associated with at least 25,000 consumers or households.
For covered services that use recommendation systems, the final legislation generally requires that:
- A minor’s account, posts and direct-message access be hidden from adults unless the adult is a parent or the minor expressly allows access.
- A minor’s location and list of connections remain hidden by default.
- Search-engine indexing and public interaction counts be disabled.
- Notifications be turned off by default.
- Platforms send no notifications between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m., or between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. on weekdays from Labor Day through Memorial Day.
- Platforms refrain from targeting minors with advertisements for narcotics, tobacco, gambling or alcohol.
- Platforms avoid deceptive interface designs and retain only the personal data needed to provide a feature the minor knowingly uses.
The law does not require a provider to collect age-verification data. If a company does collect data to verify a user’s age, it must delete that information within 15 days and cannot use it for another purpose.
Minors must also be able to request that an account be unpublished within 10 business days or permanently deleted within 45 calendar days.
Violations can be enforced by the New Jersey attorney general as consumer-fraud offenses. An injured minor or parent may also bring a civil action. For a negligent or more serious violation, a court may award $5,000 per violation or three times the actual damages, whichever is greater. That is a potential court award, not an automatic payment.
The platform requirements do not begin immediately. The code takes effect on the first day of the 13th month following enactment, giving providers roughly one year to prepare.
A second law creates a Social Media Research Center at a New Jersey college or university. The administration said the fiscal 2027 budget includes $500,000 for the center and that it intends to select a host institution this fall, according to the governor’s announcement.
A third law directs the center to study social media warning labels and other interventions and report recommendations within 18 months, according to the legislative text.
The technology industry has raised constitutional and privacy objections. NetChoice, a trade association representing online businesses, told lawmakers the code would effectively pressure platforms to verify every user’s age and could restrict lawful or anonymous speech. Those are the association’s claims, not a court ruling on the New Jersey law. Its full legislative testimony is public.