"Social Media Fairness and Transparency Act"; establishes requirements for social media companies concerning content moderation practices; establishes cause of action against social media companies for violation of content moderation practices.

S4105

SENATE, No. 4105

STATE OF NEW JERSEY

222nd LEGISLATURE

�

INTRODUCED MAY 4, 2026

Sponsored by:

Senator� CARMEN F. AMATO, JR.

District 9 (Ocean)

SYNOPSIS

���� �Social Media Fairness and Transparency Act�;
establishes requirements for social media companies concerning content
moderation practices; establishes cause of action against social media
companies for violation of content moderation practices.

CURRENT VERSION OF TEXT

���� As introduced.

��

An Act
concerning social media companies that use content
moderation practices and supplementing Title 56 of the Revised Statutes.

����
Be It
Enacted
by the Senate and General Assembly of
the State of New Jersey:

���� 1.��� This act shall be known
and may be cited as the �Social Media Fairness and Transparency Act.�

���� 2.��� As used in P.L. ,
c. (C. )
(pending before the Legislature as this bill):

���� �Algorithm� means a
mathematical set of rules that specify how a group of data will assist in
ranking search results and maintaining order or will be used in sorting or
ranking content or material based on relevancy or other factors instead of
using published time or chronological order of such content or material.

���� �Anonymous user ban� means
action by a social media company, through any means, whether the action is
determined by a natural person or an algorithm, to limit or eliminate the
exposure of a user to other users of the social media platform.� �Anonymous user
ban� includes acts of banning by a social media company that are not readily
apparent to a user.

���� �Censor� means any action
taken by a social media company to delete, regulate, restrict, edit, alter,
inhibit the publication or republication of, suspend a right to post, remove,
or post an� addendum to any content or material posted by a user.� �Censor�
includes actions to inhibit the ability of a user to be viewable by or to
interact with another user of the social media platform.

���� �Individual� means a human
being.

���� �Journalistic enterprise�
means any entity:

���� a.���� publishing words,
audio, or video online and making such published material available to Internet
users;

���� b.��� operating a cable
television channel providing content for cable television subscribers; or

���� c.���� operating under a
broadcast license issued by the Federal Communications Commission.

���� �Obscene� means material that
a reasonable person, applying contemporary community ethical standards, would
find that, taken as a whole, the dominant theme of the material appeals to
prurient interests.

���� �Post prioritization� means
action by a social media company or by the algorithm employed by the social
media company to place, feature, or prioritize certain content or material
ahead of other content or material in a newsfeed, view, or Internet search result
list.� �Post prioritization� does not include post prioritization of content
and material based on payments by a third party, including other users, to the
social media company.

���� �Post suppression� means
action by a social media company or by the algorithm employed by the social
media company to limit, censor, or suppress certain content or material in a
newsfeed, view, or Internet search result list.�

���� �Selective suspension� means
the action or practice by a social media company to permanently delete or ban a
user or to temporarily delete or ban a user for more than 60 days.

���� �Social media advertising�
means a form of digital advertising that provides paid advertisements to a
specific audience using social media platforms.

���� �Social media company� means a
sole proprietorship, partnership, limited liability company, corporation,
association, or other legal entity that is organized or operated for the profit
or financial benefit of its shareholders or other owners and that provides or
operates a social media platform.

���� �Social media platform� means
any information service, system, Internet search engine, or access software
provider that does business in the State of New Jersey, and provides or enables
computer access by multiple users to a computer server, including an Internet
website or a social media Internet website, or both that satisfies two or more
of the following conditions:

���� a.���� is open to the public;

���� b.��� has annual gross
revenues in excess of $100 million, as adjusted in January of every
odd-numbered year to reflect any increase in the Consumer Price Index;

���� c.���� has at least 100
million monthly users globally; or

���� d.��� has at least 25 million
consistent and unique monthly users who are located in the United States.

���� �Trade secret� means
information, held by one or more people, without regard to form, including a
formula, pattern, business data compilation, program, device, method,
technique, design, diagram, drawing, invention, plan, procedure, prototype, or
process, that: (1) derives independent economic value, actual or potential,
from not being generally known to, and not being readily ascertainable by
proper means by, other persons who can obtain economic value from its
disclosure or use; and (2) is the subject of efforts that are reasonable under
the circumstances to maintain its secrecy.

���� "User" means a
person who has an account on a social media platform, regardless of whether the
person posts or has posted content or material to the social media platform.

���� 3.��� a.� It shall be an
unlawful practice and violation of the New Jersey consumer fraud act, P.L.1960,
c.39 (C.56:8-1 et seq.), if a social media company that operates within this
State fails to comply with the requirements set forth in this section.� A social
media company that operates within this State shall:

���� (1)�� publish the standards,
including detailed definitions, it uses or has used for determining how to
censor, selectively suspend, or implement an anonymous user ban;

���� (2)�� apply censorship,
selective suspension, and anonymous user banning standards in a consistent
manner among its users on the social media platform;

���� (3)�� notify users about any
changes to user rules, terms, and agreements prior to implementing such
changes;

���� (4)�� not censor a user's
content or material or selectively suspend a user from the social media
platform without providing notification to the user who posted or attempted to
post the content or material, or in a way that violates State deceptive and
unfair trade practices;

���� (5)�� publish the keywords,
search terms, and other means that are used to censor, selectively suspend, or
implement an anonymous user ban;

���� (6)�� publish the keywords,
search terms, and other means that are used for post prioritization;

���� (7)�� provide a mechanism for
users who purchase a social media advertisement to request a list of other
users� unique identification codes or similar identifying information who were
provided or shown the requesting user�s content or post upon request;

���� (8)�� categorize algorithms
used for post prioritization, post suppression, and anonymous user banning and
allow users to opt-out of post prioritization and post suppression to allow
sequential or chronological posts and content;

���� (9)�� provide users with
notice on the use of and subsequent changes to algorithms used for post
prioritization, post suppression, anonymous user bans, and the content of
paragraphs (5) and (6) of this subsection and reoffer annually the opt-out
opportunity provided in paragraph (8) of this subsection;

���� (10) �allow a user who has
been selectively suspended to access or retrieve all of the user�s information,
content, material, and data from the social media platform for at least 60 days
following the date of being selectively suspended;

���� (11) �provide journalistic
enterprises with a method to identify themselves as such; and

���� (12) �not knowingly take any
action to censor, selectively suspend, or implement an anonymous user ban
against a journalistic enterprise based on the content of its publication or
broadcast.

���� b.��� Post prioritization of
certain journalistic enterprise content based on payments to the social media
platform by such journalistic enterprise is not a violation of this section.

���� 4.��� a.� Any social media
company that operates within this State that uses post suppression shall not
censor a user�s content or material on the social media platform without
providing notification to the user who posted or attempted to post the content
or material.� The notification shall:

���� (1)�� be in writing;

���� (2)�� be delivered by
electronic mail or direct electronic notification to the user within 30 days of
censoring the user�s content;

���� (3)�� include a thorough
rationale explaining why the social media� company has censored the user�s
content or material; and

���� (4)�� include a precise and
thorough explanation of how the social media company became aware of the
censored content or material, including a thorough explanation of the
algorithms used, if any, to identify the user's content or material as
objectionable.

���� b.��� Notwithstanding any
other provisions of P.L. , c.
(C. ) (pending before the
Legislature as this bill), a social media company shall not be required to
notify a user pursuant to subsection a. of this section if the censored content
or material is obscene.

���� 5.��� A social media company
that operates within this State shall not require users, in order to access the
user�s account on the social media platform, to interact with a political
advertisement directing the user to contact a State or federal legislator or to
contact a public official.

���� 6.��� In addition to the
relief provided under the New Jersey consumer fraud act, P.L.1960, c.39
(C.56:8-1 et seq.), a user may bring a private cause of action against a social
media company for a violation of paragraphs (2) or (4), or both, of subsection
a. of section 3 of P.L. , c.
(C. ) (pending before the
Legislature as this bill).� In a private cause of action brought against a
social media company pursuant to this section, the court may award all of the
following damages to the user:

���� a.���� Up to $100,000 in
statutory damages per proven claim;

���� b.��� Actual damages;

���� c.���� Punitive damages if
aggravating factors are present;

���� d.��� Other forms of equitable
relief; and

���� e.���� Costs and reasonable
attorney fees, if the user was selectively suspended in violation of paragraph
(2) of subsection a. of section 3 of P.L. ,
c. (C. )
(pending before the Legislature as this bill).

���� 7.��� In an investigation by
the Office of the Attorney General into acts of post suppression or anonymous
user banning by a social media company, the office has the power to subpoena
the social media company for any algorithm related to post suppression or anonymous
user banning and any related documentation used within the previous 24 months
related to post suppression or anonymous user banning.

���� 8.��� Nothing in P.L. ,
c. (C. )
(pending before the Legislature as this bill) shall be construed to require the
disclosure of any trade secret or abrogate any work product protection.

���� 9.��� a.� Nothing in P.L. ,
c. (C. )
(pending before the Legislature as this bill) shall be construed to interfere
with any duty imposed on a social media company by State or federal law, rule,
or regulation, including, but not limited to, any duty to preserve evidence.

���� b.��� P.L. ,
c. (C. )
(pending before the Legislature as this bill) shall not be construed to affect,
waive, or supersede any federal law, rule, or regulation governing social media
companies.� In the event of a conflict between the provisions of P.L. ,
c. (C. )
(pending before the Legislature as this bill)and a federal law, rule, or
regulation, the applicable federal law, rule, or regulation shall prevail.

���� c.���� The provisions of P.L. ,
c. (C. )
(pending before the Legislature as this bill) shall be severable, and if any of
its provisions shall be held to be unconstitutional, the decision of the court
shall not affect the validity of the remaining provisions of P.L. , c. (C. )
(pending before the Legislature as this bill).

���� 10.� This act shall take
effect immediately.

STATEMENT

���� This bill, which is designated
as the �Social Media Fairness and Transparency Act,� establishes requirements
for social media companies concerning content moderation practices and
establishes a cause of action against social media companies using content
moderation practices on their platforms.� This bill provides that it is an
unlawful practice and violation of the New Jersey consumer fraud act for a
social media company to fail to comply with the requirements set forth in the
bill.� Among other requirements enumerated in the bill, a social media company
is to publish the standards it uses or has used for determining how to censor,
�selectively suspend,� or implement an �anonymous user ban,� as these terms are
defined in the bill, and apply censorship, selective suspensions, and anonymous
user banning standards in a consistent manner among its users on the platform.

���� Additionally, social media
companies are prohibited from knowingly taking any action to censor,
selectively suspend, or implement an anonymous user ban against a journalistic
enterprise based on the content of its publication or broadcast.

���� Under this bill, a social
media company that uses post suppression is prohibited from censoring a user�s
content or material on the social media platform without providing
notification, as described in the bill, to the user who posted or attempted to
post the content or material, unless the content or material is obscene.�

���� Additionally, a social media
company is prohibited from requiring users to interact with a political
advertisement directing the user to contact a State or federal legislator or
public official before the social media company allows the user to access the
user�s account.�

���� This bill also provides that a
user may bring a private cause of action against a social media company for
certain violations under the bill.

���� Nothing in this bill is to
require disclosure of any trade secret or abrogate any work product protection.

���� Nothing in this bill is to
supersede federal law, or to interfere with any existing duty of a social media
company, including any duty to preserve evidence.