Virginia bans sale of geolocation data

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ttoomuchtodo about 2 hours ago 43 commentsRead Article on hunton.com

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Discussion (43 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews

jmward01•29 minutes ago

Given the actual informed and uncoerced choice, people say no to this kind of collection and especially its sale or use for any purpose other than the explicit service they thought they were allowing it for (navigation, setting the time, etc etc). This is true for basically all information collected. I'm glad to see there is some minor protection language being included but it needs to have real teeth and get to the point. If you collect data from me under false pretenses or using coercive methods (you can't use the thing you just paid a lot of money for if you say no) you will not only be fined but criminally prosecuted.

danielrmay•about 1 hour ago

A good start. From 2024: "A company allegedly tracked people’s visits to nearly 600 Planned Parenthood locations across 48 states and provided that data for one of the largest anti-abortion ad campaigns in the nation, according to an investigation" - https://www.politico.com/news/2024/02/13/planned-parenthood-...

giantg2•43 minutes ago

And that's pretty much the most benign use case too.

peter303•about 2 hours ago

NYTimes article a few years ago on how car insurance companies were using such data. Tracking sudden stoos, driving at night, driving faster than 80 mph, etc.

codazoda•43 minutes ago

As an aside…

I wonder why “80 mph” was picked as an arbitrary value. In rural areas of Utah we have 80 mph posted limits and prima facie speed laws. A lot of Utah drivers regularly exceed 80 MPH and I’d argue they do so legally. It’s just a weird number for them to pick.

tzs•31 minutes ago

They may be looking at a correlation between speed and claims rather than whether or not the speed is legal. Accidents at 80 mph will tend to be more severe, and possibly also more frequent.

Note that they are also looking at night driving, which as far as I know is legal everywhere, but someone who spends a higher percentage of their time driving at night probably is a bigger risk for the insurance company than a similar person who doesn't drive as much at night.

ang_cire•37 minutes ago

I'd surmise it's because several states (CA comes to the top of mind) set speeds in excess of 80 as a potential felony enhancement.

iirc in CA it's 20mph over the speed limit, or speeds over 80.

The insurance companies probably want to know who to raise rates on.

baranul•about 1 hour ago

Exactly. Exchanging private and personal user data without consent and without users being aware of it, for their profits.

thephyber•about 1 hour ago

It’s important to understand that in the USA, data is owned by the collector (eg. The app or SaaS who generated it), not the person who is described by it.

Until this legal regime changes, we will constantly be playing whack-a-mole with laws like this.

Hikikomori•19 minutes ago

That sounds like something Europeans would do, so it's anti american.

charcircuit•about 1 hour ago

The economy is not 0 sum. Someone else profiting doesn't hurt you.

jsrozner•39 minutes ago

You’re right and wrong: today’s economy is often negative sum from total utility perspective. It hurts society and the person but it helps Mark Suckerberg and Scam Altman and the private equity firms.

It’s positive sum from a wealth-weighted utility calculation though. And that’s why it happens.

markdown•about 1 hour ago

Seems you missed that part that DOES hurt us:

> Exchanging private and personal user data without consent and without users being aware of it

dv_dt•about 1 hour ago

So let's say a Delaware incorporated company sells location data that happens to be collected in Virginia, but its sold from the corporation with no operations in Virginia. What happens? On the other hand us-east-1 is in Virginia with who knows how many payment processing servers running.

b40d-48b2-979e•about 1 hour ago

The same thing that happens in court cases across state lines. It goes to one of the jurisdictions in a lawsuit unless it qualifies for diversity jurisdiction and goes to a federal court.

thephyber•about 1 hour ago

Most likely the vendor will make a judgement call about whether they care to comply. If they do want to comply, they will likely exempt all Virginia data from the collected data set and contractually require and downstream user to indemnify them if a Virginia person is affected by their data set.

HoldOnAMinute•about 1 hour ago

So, they are collecting geolocation data to avoid selling geolocation data.

BRILLIANT

avarun•18 minutes ago

As long as this is actually about "sale" of data and actually imposes strict limits on data brokers and all the nefarious actors out there, I am all for it.

If it's more similar to the California law, which just calls all uses of data "selling data" and just ends up muddying the waters without actually imposing any regulations of value on the bad actors in the industry, then that would be a shame.

There is value to actually keeping the meaning of words clear and consistent. I have no issues with Google using its first-party Google Maps data to serve me better recommendations. I have massive issues with AT&T selling aggregated geolocation data that makes it easy to identify individuals to third parties. I hope this is a clear path towards banning the latter without touching the former.

erentz•10 minutes ago

What is the rationale for going to the trouble of such a law but only banning sale, rather than all sharing?

janalsncm•about 2 hours ago

Note that this article is from April and the ban went into effect July 1.

nickvec•12 minutes ago

Have any other states banned the sale of geolocation data?

raychis•about 1 hour ago

Honestly, it’s wild that selling people’s precise location data was ever treated like a normal business model.

We already know massive data harvesting has happened. Laws like this are just the bare minimum for catching up.

Would be nice if they could bring in laws that would punish these companies out of existence, but I doubt it.

petercooper•about 1 hour ago

I was intrigued, because even a broad location given for an IP address is "geolocation data", but the law says "precise geolocation data" which limits it to device-reported data, I assume.

mathgeek•about 1 hour ago

It likely fits the definition of precise location data that you can configure on mobile settings (it's a finer grained option you can enable when sharing your location).

kube-system•about 1 hour ago

Laws typically define terms like this, and this law is no exception.

> "Precise geolocation data" means information derived from technology, including but not limited to global positioning system level latitude and longitude coordinates or other mechanisms, that directly identifies the specific location of a natural person with precision and accuracy within a radius of 1,750 feet. "Precise geolocation data" does not include the content of communications or any data generated by or connected to advanced utility metering infrastructure systems or equipment for use by a utility.

https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title59.1/chapter53/sect...

mathgeek•31 minutes ago

Yep, definitely fits with plenty of space. Thanks for confirming.

markdown•about 1 hour ago

I'm sure any coordinates would do. So long as it's not "behind the maple tree that stands across the road from Ross Dress for Less"

heroprotagonist•30 minutes ago

Great, now you have to ban sharing of it, or banning sale is worthless.

Or rather, only worthwhile as a straw-man you can point to and say "Look, we stopped it!" when you know that's false.

toomuchtodo•about 2 hours ago

Bill: https://lis.virginia.gov/bill-details/20261/SB338/text/SB338

> Virginia follows Maryland and Oregon in banning the sale of geolocation data. Both Maryland and Oregon more broadly define “sale” to mean the exchange of personal data “for monetary or other valuable consideration.” Virginia joins several other states that have recently proposed legislation with similar bans, including California, Massachusetts, Vermont and Washington State. The legislative activity follows regulatory scrutiny on the sale of geolocation data, including the California Attorney General’s investigation into the location data industry in March 2025, and a 2024 FTC settlement banning a data broker from selling geolocation data.

(i could not find a state legislation tracker regarding this type of legislation, please feel free to drop it in a reply if you find one!)

hoppyhoppy2•44 minutes ago

https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title59.1/chapter53/sect...

kevin_thibedeau•about 1 hour ago

Funny how two states with a large number of elected officials living in them opt for privacy first.

lysace•38 minutes ago

This is going to spread like wildfire. ("We can do that?")

throwaway85825•29 minutes ago

*except sale to the government?

nekusar•about 2 hours ago

So, instead you buy a "custom computer", and the data is completely free!

Its like how FLOCK gets around pesky data laws. The devices coat a lot, but the software dashboard access is "Completely free*"

hydrogen7800•about 2 hours ago

I can't find it so it's probably just a myth, but I recall hearing about "free beer with purchase of food" at bars during prohibition. However, I think it was more than just the sale that was prohibited.

VBprogrammer•about 2 hours ago

I used to regularly go to a comedy show on the site of an old brewery in Wandsworth. The comedy cost £20 but the beer was free. Apparently the site was the oldest continuous used brewery in Europe and the head brewer decided to keep the record going after the site was sold to a property development company. However, there was a prohibition against competition and licensing issues meaning they couldn't charge for beer.

Cycl0ps•about 1 hour ago

Raines Law in that late 1800s put restrictions on the sale of alcohol in NY on Sundays. Bartenders used a loophole of the drinks being served with a meal to get around it.

They would make a single sandwich, "serve" it to the patron along with their drink, then immediately take back the sandwich to "serve" it to the next person wanting a drink

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/raines-sandwich

colechristensen•about 2 hours ago

I've been to bars that required you to buy a bowl of popcorn or some such in order to abide by their restrictive liquor license which only allowed sale with food.

fastball•about 2 hours ago

Is that what Flock does?

blitzar•24 minutes ago

I for one am glad to hear they have some standards over there and refuse to profit from exploiting peoples private information.