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Regulations › US states › Minnesota

MCDPA

Minnesota Consumer Data Privacy Act

In force privacy consumer rights
WhenIn effect since 31 July 2025
Who enforces itState Attorney General
Who it applies toBusinesses that process personal data of the state's residents above the law's thresholds. Thresholds, exemptions and sensitive-data rules differ by state.

Adds rights other states lack, including the right to question the result of a profiling decision and to see the list of third parties that received data.

The law in brief

The Minnesota Consumer Data Privacy Act (MCDPA) is Minnesota's comprehensive consumer privacy law. It has been in effect since 31 July 2025. Like the other state laws built on the same model, it gives Minnesota residents rights over their personal data and puts duties on the businesses that decide how that data is used (controllers) and on the vendors that handle it for them (processors).

Adds rights other states lack, including the right to question the result of a profiling decision and to see the list of third parties that received data.

Minnesota adds rights most states lack, including the right to question the result of a profiling decision and to know the reason for it, and requires a data inventory.

Who it applies to

  • Businesses that process personal data of the state's residents above the law's thresholds. Thresholds, exemptions and sensitive-data rules differ by state.
  • The thresholds usually turn on how many Minnesota residents' personal data a business handles in a year, and whether it earns revenue from selling personal data. Check the statute for the exact figures.
  • Like most state privacy laws, it exempts some organizations and data, commonly including data already covered by HIPAA or the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, and data about people acting in an employment or commercial capacity.

What it requires

A clear privacy notice

Publish a privacy notice describing the categories of personal data you process, why, what you share and with whom, how consumers can use their rights, and how to appeal.

Collect only what you need

Limit collection to what is adequate, relevant and reasonably necessary for the purposes you disclosed, and secure it with reasonable safeguards.

Sensitive data

Get the consumer's opt-in consent before processing sensitive data, such as health information, biometric or genetic data, precise geolocation, and data about a known child (for whom parental consent is needed).

Contracts with processors

Bind each processor by contract to your instructions, confidentiality, deletion or return at the end of the service, and help with audits and assessments.

Honor opt-outs

Stop targeted advertising, sales and, where covered, qualifying profiling for consumers who opt out, and check whether the law requires you to honor universal opt-out signals such as Global Privacy Control.

Data protection assessments

Document an assessment before processing that presents a heightened risk, such as targeted advertising, selling personal data, processing sensitive data, and certain profiling.

People's rights

Minnesota residents can generally ask a business to confirm and access their personal data, correct it, delete it and get a copy in a portable format, and can opt out of targeted advertising, the sale of their data, and profiling that produces legal or similarly significant effects. Businesses generally have 45 days to respond, extendable once. Residents can usually appeal a refusal.

Enforcement and penalties

Enforced by the Minnesota Attorney General. Violations carry civil penalties set by the statute.

What to do first

  1. Check the thresholds against your Minnesota consumer numbers and any data sales.
  2. Map the personal and sensitive data you hold about Minnesota residents.
  3. Update your privacy notice and add the opt-out routes the law requires.
  4. Set up requests and appeals within the response deadlines.
  5. Put MCDPA-ready terms in processor contracts.
  6. Build one program for all state laws, then add Minnesota's departures.

Checked against the official text on 28 September 2026. Quotations are the operative words of the law, linked to the article they come from; the official text is the authority. This brief is written by the Association for practitioners and is not legal advice.

Recent developments

Nothing reported yet. Regulatory Watch lists new rules, enforcement and court decisions as they arrive.

Sources