Privacy in Pennsylvania for first responders

What protects you in Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania has both an agency-side shield and a broker-takedown statute. The Right-to-Know Law (65 P.S. §67.708(b)(6)(i)(C)) exempts home addresses of law enforcement officers and judges from public-records disclosure. The agency has to redact before releasing any document under a Right-to-Know request, and must notify you if a request comes in.

PA also has a broker-removal statute. Act 165 of 2022 (18 Pa.C.S. §2719) lets covered officers sue data brokers and online publishers that don't take their home address down within 20 business days. $1,000 per violation or actual damages, plus punitive damages and reasonable attorneys' fees. (Modeled after New Jersey's Daniel's Law.) It barely passed, but it passed. The covered-persons list is one of the broadest in the country: police, firefighters, county probation/parole, sheriffs, deputies, corrections employees, judges, AG and DA staff, public defenders, federal/state/local law enforcement, EMS, parking enforcement, magisterial district judges, constables, school personnel, the Governor and General Assembly, DEP employees, private detectives, child welfare staff, public utility and electric cooperative employees, wildlife and waterways conservation officers, health care practitioners, and the family or household members of any of the above.

Act 169 of 2014, the Police Officer Privacy Act, layers on additional restrictions on how certain commercial entities and employers can release officer personal information.

What still leaks

Three sources stay open in Pennsylvania:

1. Court filings. PA court records are widely published online through the Unified Judicial System and county docket sites. Civil filings, divorce, traffic court — addresses appear in the body of many filings unless redacted at filing time. Federal cases on PACER are entirely outside state protection.
2. Property and tax records. County recorders and assessors publish online. Property transfers go into the broker pipeline within weeks. The Right-to-Know exemption doesn't apply to property records the way it applies to personnel records.
3. Voter registration and commercial broker feeds. PA voter rolls are available to candidates and campaigns and downstream filter into commercial broker feeds. Spokeo, Whitepages, and the rest scrape from these sources and don't honor Pennsylvania-specific protections.

Laws that work for you here

• Right-to-Know Law §67.708(b)(6)(i)(C) — file with each agency that holds your records to ensure your home address is redacted before any release.
• 18 Pa.C.S. §2719 (Act 165 of 2022) — send a written demand to brokers and publishers; 20 business days to remove. If they don't, you have grounds to sue for $1,000 per violation or actual damages, plus punitive damages and attorneys' fees.
• Act 169 of 2014 (Police Officer Privacy Act) — covers specific commercial-disclosure scenarios. Talk to your union or your department's legal counsel about how it applies.
• Address Confidentiality Program — substitute-address program through the AG's office for victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, stalking, and human trafficking. Officers are not categorically eligible.

What we sweep that the state doesn't

PA gives you both an agency-side shield and a broker-side demand under Act 165. We file §2719 demands on your behalf and track the 20-business-day window. When a broker re-lists, we demand again the same day. We run standard opt-outs in parallel across 200+ broker sites — including the ones outside §2719's reach — and re-check every two weeks. After any property transaction or court filing in PA, we re-check inside 30 days because those drive the fastest re-listings.