HB5081

HB5081 creates a written-request process to limit the online exposure and sharing of sensitive personal information about Texas judges, court clerks, judicial employees and their defined immediate families. It took effect September 1, 2025. It is not a blanket right to erase every public record or news report.

Who and what it covers. The judge definition includes specified justices, magistrates, justices of the peace and retired or former judges. Covered employees work for a state court, court clerk, the Office of Court Administration (OCA) or another state judicial-branch agency. Courts include municipal and justice courts as well as higher courts. Family includes first-degree relatives by blood or marriage, plus foster children, wards, legal dependents and people in the same household.

Protected information includes home addresses; exclusively nonbusiness personal telephone numbers; email addresses; Social Security and driver’s-license numbers; bank/card details; vehicle identifiers; a minor child’s identity; birth dates; school/day-care and employment locations, schedules and routes; and images revealing those details. State-agency employment information is excluded. A property address on a real-estate or mapping website is also excluded if it is not connected to ownership, occupancy or other identifying information.

Requests and removal. Section 92.002 restricts knowing sale, licensing, trading, transfer, purchase or other dissemination after a qualifying written request. Section 92.003 separately restricts public website display after a request by the at-risk individual or OCA on that individual’s behalf. Section 92.004 requires a recipient, including a data broker, to remove identified information by the tenth business day after receipt, keep it off other public or subsidiary websites the recipient controls, identify other instances needing removal, and help the requester locate it on those sites. Section 92.006 also restricts subsequent transfers through any medium, subject to its exceptions.

Exceptions differ by activity. The dissemination rule exempts relevant public-interest news/commentary; information voluntarily published by the person concerned; requested transactions; internal or affiliated business use; health/safety alerts; specified credit-reporting, driver-privacy, financial and health-privacy activities; fraud/security work; insurance; law-enforcement support; telecommunications directory services; property, lien and similar government records; and incidental collection/sales connected to those activities. The website-display rule has its own three exceptions: relevant public-interest speech, voluntary online posting by the person concerned, and information disseminated by government or its employees/agents. The transfer rule incorporates the dissemination exceptions and separately protects relevant public-interest speech, voluntary posting and requested transfers. An exception in one provision should not be assumed to exempt every other activity.

Enforcement. An at-risk individual can seek a court order if a violation makes covered information public. After the plaintiff wins, the court may impose $500 for each day the information remains public after the order—not automatically from the request date. If the defendant is not a state agency, the court may also award exemplary damages, court costs and reasonable attorney fees.

The law separately criminalizes intentional, nonconsensual posting with intent to cause or threaten harm or harassment when harm or harassment is a probable consequence. It also creates a failure-to-remove offense for a person other than a data broker who fails to remove information identified in a Section 92.003 request within 10 business days. Offenses are Class B misdemeanors, increased to Class A if the offense results in bodily injury to the at-risk person or an immediate family member. The ordinary individual maximums are $2,000 and/or 180 days in jail for Class B, and $4,000 and/or one year for Class A.

Timing and administration. The general rule concerns information posted on or after September 1, 2025, but Sections 92.003 and 92.004 also reach older posts still available on or after that date. The criminal provision applies only when every element occurs on or after the effective date. OCA’s judge-request process is mandatory only if specifically funded; otherwise OCA may use other available appropriations. A statewide automated system is optional. This review does not establish that a particular appropriation was made or a system is operating.

Later-law distinction. HB5081 did not itself expressly add Texas-resident federal judges. Second-special-session HB16, Section 15.06, added that category effective December 4, 2025. The current code reflects that later change.

Sources: HB5081 final law, Sections 1–5; official history; judge definition; family relationships; misdemeanor penalty ranges; HB16, Section 15.06.