A bill for an act relating to harassment by the dissemination, publication, distribution, or posting of personal information, and making penalties applicable.
Senate File 35 amends Iowa’s harassment statute to create a new form of harassment based on the purposeful, nonconsensual dissemination of another person’s personal information. The bill makes it a crime when someone, without a legitimate purpose, publishes, posts, distributes, or otherwise shares personal information about another person with the intent to threaten, intimidate, annoy, or alarm that person, or to encourage others to do so.
The bill defines “personal information” broadly to include a person’s or family’s contact information, such as home address, phone number, email address, social media profile, place of employment, and photographic or film depictions, as well as other information that could be used to threaten, intimidate, annoy, or alarm the person or family. A violation is classified as harassment in the first degree, an aggravated misdemeanor, which carries up to two years of confinement and a fine.
SF 35 would expand Iowa Code section 708.7 by adding a new harassment offense tied to doxxing-like conduct and by expressly making that conduct punishable as first-degree harassment. It also adds a statutory definition of personal information, broadening the scope of protected information to include both direct contact details and other identifying material related to a person or the person’s family. The bill would affect individuals who publish or share such information and would give law enforcement and prosecutors a clearer basis for charging online or offline disclosure intended to harass.
The available voting history suggests strong bipartisan support for the bill. It received a unanimous 19-0 Senate Judiciary report and then passed the Senate 46-0, indicating broad agreement that the conduct targeted by the bill is harmful and should be criminalized. No committee transcript is available, but the recorded votes show little to no visible opposition at those stages.
No specific objections are documented in the available materials, but the bill’s main area of potential contention is its breadth. Because “personal information” includes social media profiles, place of employment, family contact information, and even photographic or film depictions, critics could view the definition as expansive and potentially implicating speech or privacy concerns. Supporters, by contrast, would likely emphasize the bill’s focus on intent, lack of legitimate purpose, and the requirement that the disclosure be made to threaten, intimidate, annoy, or alarm, which narrows it to harassment rather than ordinary publication.