Title: BAD ADS Act
Policy area: Science, Technology, Communications

Summary:
Behavioral Advertising Decisions Are Downgrading Services Act or the BAD ADS Act
This bill limits the protection of certain providers of interactive computer services from liability for screening and blocking offensive content on their platforms. Specifically, the bill removes such protection if a provider (1) displays behavioral advertising (e.g., advertising based on the personal traits or previous behavior of a user), or (2) provides data regarding a user to another person knowing that the other person will use that data to create or display behavioral advertising.
A covered provider is any entity that provides an interactive computer service whereby information from other content providers is distributed and which, during the previous year, had more than (1) $1.5 billion in global revenue, and (2) 30 million U.S. users or 300 million worldwide users.

[Congressional Bills 116th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. 4337 Introduced in Senate (IS)]

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116th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                S. 4337

   To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to stop granting immunity 
 subsidies to companies that engage in behavioral advertising, and for 
                            other purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                   IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

                             July 28, 2020

  Mr. Hawley introduced the following bill; which was read twice and 
   referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
   To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to stop granting immunity 
 subsidies to companies that engage in behavioral advertising, and for 
                            other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Behavioral Advertising Decisions Are 
Downgrading Services Act'' or the ``BAD ADS Act''.

SEC. 2. LIMITATION ON IMMUNITY.

    (a) In General.--Section 230(c) of the Communications Act of 1934 
(47 U.S.C. 230(c)) is amended by adding at the end the following:
            ``(3) Limitation on protection.--
                    ``(A) Definitions.--In this paragraph--
                            ``(i) the term `advertisement server' means 
                        a person that serves or delivers advertisements 
                        to a user of a website, online service, online 
                        application, or mobile application;
                            ``(ii) the term `behavioral advertising'--
                                    ``(I) means a form of advertising 
                                in which an advertisement is displayed 
                                to a user of an interactive computer 
                                service based on--
                                            ``(aa) the personal traits 
                                        of the user;
                                            ``(bb) previous location 
                                        information with respect to the 
                                        user;
                                            ``(cc) personal information 
                                        from a profile about the user 
                                        that is created for the purpose 
                                        of selling advertisements; or
                                            ``(dd) the previous online 
                                        or offline behavior of the 
                                        user; and
                                    ``(II) does not include contextual 
                                advertising, such as advertising that 
                                is directed to a user based on--
                                            ``(aa) the content of the 
                                        website, online service, online 
                                        application, or mobile 
                                        application to which the user 
                                        is connected;
                                            ``(bb) the location of the 
                                        user, as of the time at which 
                                        the advertising is directed to 
                                        the user; or
                                            ``(cc) the search terms 
                                        that the user applied to arrive 
                                        at the website, service, or 
                                        application to which the user 
                                        is connected; and
                            ``(iii) the term `covered provider'--
                                    ``(I) means an entity that--
                                            ``(aa) provides an 
                                        interactive computer service--

                                                    ``(AA) through a 
                                                website, online 
                                                application, or mobile 
                                                application (including 
                                                a single interactive 
                                                computer service that 
                                                is provided through 
                                                more than 1 such 
                                                website or 
                                                application);

                                                    ``(BB) through 
                                                which information 
                                                provided by another 
                                                information content 
                                                provider is 
                                                distributed; and

                                                    ``(CC) that, in any 
                                                month during the most 
                                                recently completed 12-
                                                month period, more than 
                                                30,000,000 users in the 
                                                United States (or more 
                                                than 300,000,000 users 
                                                worldwide) accessed, 
                                                without regard to the 
                                                means by which the 
                                                users accessed the 
                                                service; and

                                            ``(bb) during the most 
                                        recently completed taxable 
                                        year, had more than 
                                        $1,500,000,000 in global 
                                        revenue; and
                                    ``(II) does not include an 
                                organization described in section 
                                501(c) of the Internal Revenue Code of 
                                1986 that is exempt from taxation under 
                                section 501(a) of such Code.
                    ``(B) Applicability.--The protections provided 
                under paragraphs (1) and (2) shall not apply with 
                respect to a covered provider for any claim arising 
                during the 30-day period beginning on the date on which 
                the covered provider--
                            ``(i) displays behavioral advertising to a 
                        user of the interactive computer service 
                        described in subparagraph (A)(iii)(I)(aa) 
                        provided by the covered provider; or
                            ``(ii) provides data regarding a user of 
                        the interactive computer service described in 
                        clause (i) to another person knowing that the 
                        other person will use that data to create or 
                        display behavioral advertising.
                    ``(C) Liability of advertisement servers in place 
                of covered providers.--An advertisement server shall be 
                held liable for any claim brought against a covered 
                provider because of the application of subparagraph (B) 
                if, after the covered provider directs the 
                advertisement server not to serve or deliver behavioral 
                advertising to users of the interactive computer 
                service described in subparagraph (A)(iii)(I)(aa) 
                provided by the covered provider (or if the 
                advertisement server fails to provide reasonably 
                accessible means to receive that direction from the 
                covered provider), the covered provider unknowingly 
                takes the action described in subparagraph (B)(i) 
                because of an action taken by the advertisement server, 
                including the failure of the advertisement server to 
                provide the covered provider with a conspicuous 
                disclosure regarding the category of advertisements to 
                be displayed.''.
    (b) Effective Date.--This section, and the amendments made by this 
section, shall take effect on the date that is 180 days after the date 
of enactment of this Act.
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