Cloud firms get legal shield for storing abuse images
S. 3023 — Safe Cloud Storage Act · Filed by Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) · 9 cosponsors · Introduced Oct 21, 2025 · Passed chamber
Your members of Congress
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What it does
This bill shields cloud storage firms from most lawsuits. They store child abuse images for police. Firms must follow security rules and keep data in the US. Firms must tell the Justice Department about changes. Firms are shielded from lawsuits unless they act on purpose. They are also shielded if they are reckless.
Who it affects
Cloud storage firms that work with law enforcement gain the legal shield. Kids whose abuse images are stored may lose the right to sue firms. Police get secure storage for case files.
One thing to notice
Firms can be sued only for acting on purpose or being reckless. A firm could break its own security rules and still be shielded. The break must be careless, not on purpose.
From the analysis of the bill text, linked under Primary records below.
Where it stands
9 cosponsors: 5 Democrats, 4 Republicans.
- Oct 21, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in Senate”
- Oct 21, 2025 — Referred to Senate Committee on the Judiciary · Congress.gov: “Read twice and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary”
- Feb 5, 2026 — Reported out of committee · Congress.gov: “Committee on the Judiciary. Ordered to be reported with an amendment in the nature of a substitute favorably”
- May 20, 2026 — Passed the Senate · Congress.gov: “Passed Senate with an amendment by Unanimous Consent. (text of amendment in the nature of a substitute: CR…”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Money around this bill
3 groups reported lobbying about this bill. They filed 5 reports from Dec 2025 to Jun 2026.
Those reports show $4,720,000 in lobbying spending. Each report lists about 18 bills. So that money was not all for this bill.
More groups named this bill than 61% of bills with any report.
Marsha Blackburn, who sponsored the bill, received $133,620 from PACs for the 2026 election.
- American Association for Justice — $3,610,000 in 2 reports
- Roblox Corporation — $870,000 in 2 reports
- Snap Inc. — $240,000 in 1 report
Lobbying is legal. These reports show who lobbied about this bill, not what changed.
Words to know
- security rules — steps to protect computer systems and data from attack
- reckless — ignoring danger or rules in a careless way
- shielded — protected from being sued
- lobbying — Trying to influence lawmakers about a bill. Companies and groups pay people to do this.
- PACs — Groups that collect money and give it to candidates for office.
- sponsored — To sponsor a bill is to introduce it in Congress and put your name on it.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (8,756 characters) on Jul 10, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 14,358 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
Money — Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act filings whose specific-issue field names this bill for quarters ending Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. A filing's amount is reported whole beside the median number of bills a filing names; it is never divided across them. PAC receipts are FEC-reported contributions to the sponsor's candidate committee in the 2026 cycle.
As of — lobbying records through Jul 23, 2026 · page rendered 2026-09-19.
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