California students will soon have stronger privacy protections when it comes to the technology many of them use every day for schoolwork, after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a new bill into law Thursday that tightens rules on how education technology companies handle student data.
The measure, Assembly Bill 1159, targets companies such as Canvas and Duolingo and bars them from using student data to train or build artificial intelligence systems. The legislation comes as California schools at every level — from kindergarten classrooms to community colleges and universities — increasingly turn to AI tools for instruction, grading and administrative tasks.
Authored by Assemblymember Dawn Addis, a Democrat from San Luis Obispo, the bill builds on a landmark 2014 California law that restricted how ed-tech companies could use data collected from students in preschool through 12th grade. The new law extends similar protections to college students and widens the range of companies that must comply.
“Ensuring data privacy and protection is vital to our children’s well-being, dignity, and right to learn,” Addis said in a statement Thursday. “No child should be put at risk of big tech taking advantage of their personal data for financial — or any kind of — gain.”
The bill drew support from labor groups representing teachers, nurses and college faculty across the state, many of which have long been influential donors in Sacramento. It faced opposition from TechNet and the California Chamber of Commerce, two organizations that frequently advocate on behalf of the tech industry. Neither group responded to requests for comment.
California was the first state in the nation to regulate how education technology firms use student information when it passed its original law more than a decade ago. But as digital tools became embedded in nearly every part of student life, gaps in that law became apparent. The original statute applied only to companies whose products were “primarily” designed and marketed for students — a threshold that let major platforms such as Google and YouTube sidestep the rules, even though their tools are widely used in classrooms.
The new law closes that gap. It applies to any company that knows its products are being used in schools and that markets or designs its tools with students in mind. Those companies are now barred from selling student data or using it for anything beyond educational purposes.
“It’s a good day for our children, it’s a good day for the state of California, and it’s a good day for California’s leadership,” Newsom said at a Thursday news conference, where he signed AB 1159 alongside a dozen other bills addressing children’s safety and technology use, including measures restricting minors’ access to AI chatbots.
Even with the expanded protections, the law has limits. It does not necessarily cover apps or websites students use outside the classroom or that haven’t been formally adopted by their schools — tools often recommended by a coach, teacher, parent or friend for things like sports schedules, tutoring or after-school programs.
Under federal law, companies must obtain parental consent before knowingly collecting or selling data from children age 12 and younger. But outside of that protection, and beyond the reach of California’s new law, children using technology on their own time are generally afforded no more privacy than adults.
Original source: CalMatters
