California Gov. Newsom Signs SB 690, Narrowing CIPA Pen-Register Claims
Governor Newsom signed SB 690 on September 30, 2026, curtailing but not ending private litigation over website tracking tools under California's Invasion of Privacy Act.
On September 30, 2026, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 690, which narrows—but does not extinguish—the growing body of private claims challenging use of website tracking technologies under the state's Invasion of Privacy Act. The bill addresses the "pen register" theory of CIPA liability, under which plaintiffs have treated data captured by analytics and advertising pixels as a private wire communication intercepted in transit.
For product counsel, the practical consequence is a change in exposure calculus rather than a reprieve. Businesses deploying pixels, session-replay tools, SDKs, and tag managers across consumer-facing properties need a current view of which features remain actionable under the amended statute and which theories are now foreclosed, and how the change interacts with the still-pending cases rather than resolving them. Class action plaintiffs' firms are expected to test the boundaries of the amendment, so early appellate construction may arrive before the case set clears.
Immediate actions: map tracking technologies in use by jurisdiction and purpose, reassess demand-letter posture on the narrowed theories, and monitor the first appellate decisions construing SB 690. The source is a single firm alert; the bill text and any accompanying statutory language should be confirmed directly.