Daniel's Law

What Daniel's Law actually does

If you're a sworn officer, judge, or prosecutor in New Jersey, active or retired, Daniel's Law gives you a hammer. The statute (NJSA §47:1B-1) lets you force brokers to take your home address down.

You can demand any data broker take down your home address and unpublished phone. They get ten business days. Miss the deadline, and it's $1,000 per violation in court. The 2023 amendment made that $1,000 mandatory liquidated damages, not a cap, plus punitive damages where the violation is willful or reckless.

The law was named for Daniel Anderl, the 20-year-old son of US District Judge Esther Salas, killed in 2020 when an attacker who'd looked up his mother's home address came to the door. The shooter, a disgruntled litigant, had bought the address from a commercial broker. The bill cleared the NJ legislature within eighteen months.

Who it covers

The list expanded with the 2023 amendment. Today the law covers:

• Active and retired judges, state and federal sitting in NJ
• Active and retired prosecutors and assistant prosecutors
• Active and retired sworn law enforcement officers
• Active and retired correctional officers
• Child protective investigators in the Division of Child Protection and Permanency
• Spouses, domestic partners, parents, and minor children of any of the above living at the same residence

If you fall into any of those categories, you can act. If you're not sure, the NJ Daniel's Law portal FAQ walks the eligibility checks. Active personnel verify through their employing agency. Retirees verify through their pension records.

How to use it

You don't need a lawyer to send a notice. The mechanics:

1. Find the listing. Pull the exact URL where your address or phone shows. A scan (run a free one) gives you the broker list and the live URLs.
2. Write the notice. Cite NJSA §47:1B-1 et seq. by name. State that you're a covered person under the statute. Don't claim a category you don't qualify for, that gets the notice tossed.
3. Identify the data. Address, unpublished phone, prior addresses tied to your name. Be precise. Vague notices give the broker an out.
4. Demand removal in ten business days. The clock starts on the broker's receipt of the notice, not on the postmark. That distinction matters at trial.
5. Send it. Email if the broker publishes a privacy contact, certified mail to the registered agent if you want a delivery receipt that's bulletproof in court.
6. Save proof. Sent timestamp, delivery receipt, any reply, and a dated screenshot of the listing on day eleven if it's still live.

Use the Daniel's Law demand letter template if you want a drafted version to sign and send.

If the broker doesn't comply, you have grounds to sue in NJ Superior Court. The 2023 amendment also added an assignment right, you can transfer your claim to a third party that handles the litigation. That's how Atlas Data Privacy Corp files batched suits on behalf of thousands of officers. Many brokers comply rather than litigate.

There's also a criminal hook. N.J.S.A. 2C:20-31.1 makes it a crime to disclose covered home addresses or unpublished phone numbers with intent to expose a covered person to harassment or harm. Third-degree felony if the disclosure leads to bodily injury. That's a separate path, a prosecutor's call, not yours, but it exists.

Sample notice language

A working notice doesn't have to be long. The four pieces it must contain:

• "I am a covered person under N.J.S.A. 47:1B-1 et seq. as a [active/retired sworn law enforcement officer / prosecutor / judge / immediate family member of a covered person]."
• "You are publishing my [home address / unpublished home telephone number] at the following URL: [exact URL]."
• "I demand removal of this information within ten (10) business days of your receipt of this notice, pursuant to N.J.S.A. 47:1B-1 et seq."
• "Failure to comply will result in a civil action for liquidated damages of $1,000 per violation, plus reasonable attorneys' fees, costs, and punitive damages where applicable."

Sign, date, send. The full template is downloadable on the demand letter page.

Where it has teeth

Atlas Data Privacy Corp represents thousands of NJ officers. Since the 2023 expansion, they've filed batched Daniel's Law actions against more than 100 data brokers. By late 2024 there were 37+ consolidated civil cases pending in the District of New Jersey alone. Settlements are confidential. The volume tells you the law works. Most national brokers now run a dedicated intake process for Daniel's Law requests because that's cheaper than defending the suits.

The Third Circuit upheld the statute against broker First Amendment challenges in Atlas Data Privacy Corp. v. We Inform LLC (Sept. 2024). The court held that Daniel's Law survives intermediate scrutiny because the state's interest in protecting officers and judges from targeted violence is concrete and the statute is narrowly tailored to home address and unpublished phone, not to speech generally. That ruling shut the door on the broker industry's strongest constitutional argument.

The New Jersey Supreme Court heard oral arguments in March 2026 on the contours of who counts as a "covered person" and what triggers the statutory-damages clock. The court is expected to clarify whether each republication is a separate violation, what counts as good-faith compliance, and whether a broker that takes down a record but leaves cached data live still owes damages. Decision pending. The statute is alive and being enforced while the court works through the edges.

State legislators floated S-3527 in late 2025 to cap the per-violation damages, framed as litigation reform. Judge Salas pushed back publicly through Reuters in April 2026 and the cap has not advanced. The statute as written stands.

What about retirees, families, non-LE first responders, out-of-state filings

A few common questions.

Retirees. Coverage is the same as active. The 2023 amendment confirmed "formerly active or retired" status. A 20-and-out officer ten years gone keeps the right to file.

Spouses, parents, minor children. Covered if they live at the same residence as the covered person. A divorced ex-spouse who's moved out is not covered. An adult child living elsewhere is not covered, the law is structured around the home, not the relationship.

Firefighters and EMS. Not covered under Daniel's Law itself. NJ first responders outside law enforcement, judges, or corrections rely on OPRA exemptions and the broader DPPA. If you're a firefighter or EMS in NJ and want a state-level broker remedy, the statute as currently written doesn't reach you.

Out-of-state filings. Daniel's Law applies to anyone publishing into NJ, regardless of where the broker is incorporated. A Delaware or California broker that sells access to NJ residents is bound. Practical reach against offshore brokers is weaker, the suit is filed in NJ Superior Court but collection on a foreign judgment is harder. Most national brokers have NJ counsel on retainer, so the practical reach is broad.

Federal court records (PACER). Daniel's Law doesn't bind federal courts. If your home address appeared in a federal filing, removal goes through the federal records-management process separately.

Property records. Daniel's Law does not require county recorders to remove address information from deed transfers. NJ provides separate property-record protections through the ACP and through OPRA exemptions under P.L. 2024, c.16. See /states/new-jersey for the layered approach.

What if the broker re-lists you

This is the most common failure mode. Broker takes down the listing on day eight, then six months later a new data feed re-lists you from a fresh ingest. Each re-publication is a separate violation. The ten-day clock starts over each time. Document the re-listing with a dated screenshot, send the notice again, and add the second listing to any existing claim.

If a broker re-lists you twice after acknowledged removal, that's a stronger willfulness argument for punitive damages. Save every removal confirmation email, the timeline is your evidence.

Where it doesn't reach

• Federal court records (PACER). Federal records-management process applies. See /laws/lieu-act.
• Out-of-state brokers with no NJ nexus. Some smaller brokers headquartered abroad may ignore notices. The law applies to anyone who sells into NJ, but smaller actors take that as a risk.
• Property records. County recorders and assessors are not covered. Daniel's Law does not require redaction from deed transfers.
• Information you publicly published yourself. If your address shows in your own social media or business filing, the broker has a defense.

Where else this kind of law exists

Daniel's Law was the template. Since 2021, fourteen jurisdictions have passed similar broker-removal statutes. Coverage and teeth vary, most cover only judges, a few go broader. The full list as of 2026:

• New Jersey — N.J.S.A. 47:1B-1 (2021, expanded 2023). Broadest coverage: judges, LEOs, prosecutors, families. The original.
• Federal (Lieu Act) — Pub. L. 117-263 (2022). Federal judges and immediate family only. See /laws/lieu-act.
• Nebraska — Neb. Rev. Stat. §23-3211 (2022). Judges, law enforcement officers, Nebraska National Guard members.
• Missouri — Mo. Rev. Stat. §476.1300 (2023). Active, former, retired judges plus prosecuting and circuit attorneys.
• Delaware — Del. Code tit. 10 §§1921–1924 (2023). State judicial officers and families.
• Florida — Fla. Stat. §119.071 expanded (2024). Judges, LEOs, court staff, firefighters, prosecutors, public defenders, certain state agency personnel, spouses and children.
• Georgia — Ga. Code §§15-5-110 to 15-5-112 (2024). State, county, municipal, and federal judges plus spouses.
• Hawaii — Haw. Rev. Stat. §92H (2024). Governor, legislators, judges, election employees, appointed officials, families.
• Maryland — Md. Code Ann., Cts. & Jud. Proc. §3-2301 (2024). Current and retired state and federal judges, magistrates, court commissioners, families.
• New York — N.Y. Jud. Law §859 (2024). Active and former judges and immediate families.
• Oklahoma — Okla. Stat. §3012 (2024). Active and retired state, municipal, county, tribal, and federal judges plus immediate family.
• Minnesota — Minn. Stat. §13.991 (2025). Active, senior, retired judges plus judicial branch employees and referees.
• Wisconsin — Wis. Stat. §757.07 (2025). Current and former state judges, court commissioners, immediate families.
• West Virginia — Daniel's Law (2021). Held facially unconstitutional by Jackson v. Whitepages, N.D. W.Va. (Aug. 2025) for lack of a notice requirement. Legislature is expected to amend. See /incidents/west-virginia-officer-whitepages-suit-2024 for the case backstory.

Most of those analogs cover judges only. New Jersey, Florida, and Nebraska are the ones with first-responder breadth. If you're outside those three, the law in your state probably won't help if you're a patrol officer or firefighter, agency-side public-records exemptions and the federal DPPA are the levers that do.

The 2005 Lefkow case was the older twin of the Anderl attack. Same shape, fifteen years before, before the legal protections that exist now. Both cases drove the legislative argument that produced Daniel's Law and the federal Lieu Act. Cases like these exist because, before the laws, the address-and-photos lookup was trivial and the response was nothing.

What we do here

We file Daniel's Law notices on your behalf. We track every broker's response. When a broker re-lists you, and some do, six months later, we notice them again. The law was written to make removal stick. The brokers were not. That work runs through the Frontline Privacy plan for individual covered persons.

When a broker has been noticed twice and still won't comply, the next escalation is the state AG. The broker non-compliance complaint template walks through the evidence package and the filing path. NJ AG is one of the more active offices because of the volume of Daniel's Law cases.

If you're outside New Jersey, see /states for what your state actually gives you.