SB 690 has been signed into law, and the law firm Holland & Knight frames the open question in its own headline: "Will the CIPA Shakedown Continue?" For any photo business running a website with tracking pixels, session-replay scripts or analytics tools, that question is not academic. It's a line item.

The shorthand matters here. CIPA is the California Invasion of Privacy Act, a decades-old wiretapping statute that plaintiffs' firms have repurposed into a vehicle for lawsuits over web tracking. The "shakedown" in the firm's phrasing refers to the settlement-driven litigation economy that grew up around it — demand letters, class claims, and nuisance-value settlements that cost defendants less than a motion to dismiss.

SB 690, now law, responds to that dynamic. The details of what the amendment does — and, more importantly, what it doesn't do — are exactly what Holland & Knight's analysis walks through. The firm's framing signals that the legislative fix is partial, not a cure.

What does this change for photo businesses?

The honest answer: it depends on how courts read the new language, and that takes time. If you operate a portfolio site, a client gallery platform or an e-commerce storefront serving California visitors, the exposure theory behind these claims ran through third-party tracking technology communicating with your site. An amendment changes the statutory footing; it doesn't retroactively erase pending claims or guarantee that creative plaintiffs' counsel won't find a new angle.

The practical checklist hasn't changed, even if the statute has:

• Audit what third-party scripts run on your site — analytics, chat widgets, ad pixels.
• Check your consent banner logic against what the amended law actually requires, not what your vendor's marketing page says it solves.
• Ask counsel whether pending demand letters are affected by the amendment or only future conduct.

Shipped law, untested effects

A useful distinction from the gear desk applies to legislation too: a shipped product and a working product are different things. SB 690 is shipped. Its effect on the CIPA litigation wave is unmeasured until courts interpret it and plaintiffs' firms show whether they'll adapt or move on.

Holland & Knight's own headline carries the skepticism. Law firms that defend these cases don't title client alerts with questions when they believe the answer is settled. The implication is that website operators should treat SB 690 as risk mitigation, not risk elimination.

For studios and agencies, the budget reality is blunt. A single tracking-related class claim, even a weak one, can cost more in defense fees than a full website rebuild with a proper consent architecture. The firms sending these letters priced them that way on purpose.

What comes next

Watch two signals in the coming months: whether new CIPA filings against website operators slow after the amendment's effective terms kick in, and whether plaintiffs' counsel pivot to alternative theories the law leaves untouched. Both will show up in dockets before they show up in trade coverage. Until then, the conservative read is that SB 690 raises the cost of the shakedown without ending the business model behind it.