Consumers across the US could gain more control over how companies collect and use their personal information through state legislative efforts to create new data privacy requirements.

Eight States: Lawmakers in Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Mississippi, New York, Oklahoma, Oregon, and Tennessee so far this year have proposed bolstering company disclosure and consumer consent standards over how their information is collected and processed. New Jersey privacy legislation introduced in 2022 carries over into the second year of the state’s session.

These measures, if enacted, would add to laws in California, Virginia, Connecticut, Utah, and Colorado that aim to safeguard consumer data online. They’re part of a growing push by state lawmakers to address a range of privacy issues—such as protecting biometric identifiers and health data—in the absence of a comprehensive federal law.

Compliance Challenge: The greatest compliance challenges for clients doing business at a national level will come if states begin to deviate significantly from the five state privacy laws going into effect this year, said Lisa Sotto, a partner at Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP.

“It’s going to get nearly impossible to comply with the panoply of state laws that will certainly be in place in the coming years,” Sotto said.