• by Wendy Davis  @wendyndavis, September 13, 2023

Delaware Governor John Carney this week signed a privacy law that gives residents the right to opt out of the use of their data for online behavioral advertising.

The Delaware Personal Data Privacy Act, HB 154, specifically provides that consumers can opt out of ads based on pseudonymous data collected over time and across nonaffiliated sites -- including data stored on cookies or through other identifiers. The law doesn't restrict companies from serving ads based on first-party data, or from serving contextual ads -- such as ads based on the content of a site or app where they appear.

The measure also requires companies to honor universal opt-out signals that consumers can transmit with mechanisms like the Global Privacy Control. That tool, developed by privacy advocates, sends an opt-out command to every website that consumers visit.

Additionally, the law gives residents the right to learn what non-pseudonymous data has been collected about them, and requires companies to delete that data upon request.

Delaware is now the 12th state with a comprehensive privacy law, and the seventh state to enact such a law this year.

Other states that passed privacy laws this year include Florida, Iowa, Indiana, Montana, Tennessee and Texas. Five other states -- California, Colorado, Connecticut, Utah and Virginia -- previously enacted online privacy laws. 

Most of those statutes require companies to let residents reject ad targeting based on pseudonymous data.

The Delaware law will take effect in 2025.