Anti-Domestic Violence Organizations call on Congress to pass the DELETE Act

Dear Honorable Senators and Representatives,

The undersigned organizations are deeply concerned about the risks that data brokers pose to the privacy and safety of abuse survivors. We urge Congress to pass the DELETE Act (H.R.4311), which will finally give abuse survivors the control they need over sensitive and private information about themselves online.

A large number of individuals in the United States are vulnerable to domestic violence, dating violence, stalking, and sexual assault. Each year, an average of millions of adults face sexual violence, physical violence, or stalking by an intimate partner alone. For survivors fleeing their abusers, privacy is not just a matter of principle – it can be a matter of life and death. Ensuring survivors can seek safety, accountability, and healing requires comprehensive privacy protections, some of which are already enshrined in federal and state-level statutes. 

Yet, significant gaps remain in our current legal framework. Data brokers, tech companies that collect and sell personally identifying data about individuals without their permission, are not covered by existing protections for abuse survivors. These brokers share sensitive and personal information, including residential and employment addresses, phone numbers, social security numbers, location history, purchase history, and web browsing history. Abusers can easily purchase information from data brokers to stalk, threaten, or harass survivors and the advocates, counselors, healthcare workers, lawyers, and other helpers who support them. Recognizing these immense dangers, in 2023 California passed a bill similar to the DELETE Act. As Congress continues its efforts to protect the privacy of everyday people against the overreaches of powerful tech companies, the needs, and experiences of domestic violence survivors—who are among those most likely to experience direct and life-threatening harm from data brokers’ dangerous business model—should be addressed at the center of any legislation. The DELETE Act addresses these critical needs and must be passed with urgency.

Today, abuse survivors must bear the burden of protecting their privacy by paying for data deletion services and constantly monitoring online search results to request that their information be taken down from data broker websites over and over again. This process can take weeks and is not accessible. With one click, the DELETE Act will change the daily lived realities of abuse survivors across this country. Having a single web page where survivors can request all data be deleted permanently—and know that it will never be relisted—would be an extremely powerful change. The data broker industry in the US is vast and unregulated. Given that there are over 500 data brokers in the US, ensuring that these data brokers don’t risk a survivor’s safety can’t be a matter of personal responsibility. The DELETE Act will mandate that all data brokers in the country are accounted for and will allow survivors to regain control over the private information data brokers share without the overwhelming amount of time and money required to reach out to each data broker individually. 

As organizations dedicated to the empowerment of abuse survivors, we stand behind the DELETE Act and its provisions, which will deliver real-world harm reduction for anyone who may ever face abuse as well as for our own employees and volunteers. We urge you to champion the privacy rights of abuse survivors and all people living in the US and pass the DELETE Act immediately. 

Sincerely,

Clinic to End Tech Abuse at Cornell Tech
The Domestic Violence Project at the Urban Justice Center
Hope’s Door
New York Cyber Abuse Task Force
New York State Coalition Against Domestic Violence
Sanctuary for Families
The STEM Alliance, Westchester County, NY