Online content: cyberbullying.

Existing law, the Safe Place to Learn Act, requires the State Department of Education to assess whether local educational agencies have taken certain actions related to educational equity, including adopting a policy that prohibits discrimination, harassment, intimidation, and bullying based on specified characteristics. Existing law requires local educational agencies, as defined, to adopt procedures for preventing acts of bullying, including cyberbullying. Existing law also prohibits a pupil from being suspended from school or recommended for expulsion, unless the superintendent of the school district or the principal of the school in which the pupil is enrolled determines that the pupil has committed a specified act, including, among other acts, engaging in an act of bullying, which includes communications made in writing or by means of an electronic act, as defined. This bill would require a social media platform, as defined, and subject to specified exceptions, to disclose all cyberbullying, as defined, reporting procedures in the social media platform's terms of service, and would require a social media platform to establish a mechanism within its internet-based service that allows an individual, whether or not that individual has a profile on the internet-based service, to report cyberbullying or any content that violates the existing terms of service, as specified. Beginning September 1, 2023, this bill would make a social media platform that intentionally violates these provisions subject to specified civil penalties or injunction, to be prosecuted in a court of competent jurisdiction by the Attorney General. The bill would specify that its provisions do not create a private right of action or limit any existing private right of action.