More than 2.3 million renters across New South Wales will soon receive landmark protections against invasive privacy breaches and deceptive listings following the passage of major legislative reforms through State Parliament.
The Residential Tenancies (Protection of Personal Information) Amendment Bill 2025 introduces tough rules to prevent real estate agents and landlords from over-collecting sensitive personal details.
Under the new framework, applicants can no longer be asked to disclose unnecessary private information, such as social media accounts, details about their children, personal photographs, or whether they have tattoos.
Identification documents like driver licences and passports will only be collected from a preferred applicant before signing a lease. The measure aims to eliminate an estimated 187,000 identity documents previously gathered unnecessarily from unsuccessful applicants each year, significantly curbing the risk of data breaches.
The legislation also directly addresses deceptive marketing tactics by requiring landlords and real estate agents to disclose when property images have been digitally altered or generated using artificial intelligence. This targets instances where AI-generated furniture or digital editing obscures structural damage or misrepresents property proportions.
To manage cost-of-living impacts, listings must also state if a dwelling uses an embedded utility network, preventing unexpected energy bills when tenants are locked into a single provider.
Penalties for non-compliance are severe. Privacy violations carry fines of up to AU$11,000 for individuals and AU$49,500 for corporations, while businesses that fail to disclose altered marketing photographs face fines of up to $22,000.
Minister for Better Regulation and Fair Trading Anoulack Chanthivong said the measures establish some of the nation’s strongest protections.
“These laws put an end to the practise of excessive and intrusive data collection in the rental process and make it fairer for renters and less stressful for landlords and agents. Whether you have a tattoo, or what school your kids go to, is not relevant to whether you’ll be a good tenant,” the minister said.
The government is currently consulting stakeholders to finalise a standardised rental application form and document destruction guidelines ahead of the laws taking effect in early 2027.