2014 New York Laws
GBS - General Business
Article 7 - (70 - 89-A) PRIVATE INVESTIGATORS, BAIL ENFORCEMENT AGENTS AND WATCH, GUARD AND PATROL AGENCIES
70 - Licenses.

  70.  Licenses.  1.  The department of state shall have the power to
  issue separate  licenses  to  private  investigators,  bail  enforcement
  agents  and  to watch, guard or patrol agencies. Nothing in this article
  shall prevent a private investigator licensed hereunder from  performing
  the  services  of  a  watch,  guard or patrol agency or bail enforcement
  agent as defined herein; however, a watch, guard  or  patrol  agency  or
  bail  enforcement  agent  may  not  perform  the  services  of a private
  investigator as defined herein.
2. No person, firm, company, partnership, limited liability company or
  corporation shall  engage  in  the  business  of  private  investigator,
  business  of  bail enforcement agents or the business of watch, guard or
  patrol agency, or advertise his, their or its business  to  be  that  of
  private  investigator,  bail enforcement agent or watch, guard or patrol
  agency, notwithstanding the name or title used in describing such agency
  or notwithstanding the fact that other functions and services  may  also
  be performed for fee, hire or reward, without having first obtained from
  the department of state a license so to do, as hereinafter provided, for
  each  bureau,  agency, sub-agency, office and branch office to be owned,
  conducted,  managed  or  maintained  by  such  person,  firm,   company,
  partnership, limited liability company or corporation for the conduct of
  such business.
3. No person, firm, company, partnership, limited liability company or
  corporation  shall engage in the business of furnishing or supplying for
  fee, hire or any consideration or reward information as to the  personal
  character  or  activities  of any person, firm, company, or corporation,
  society or association, or any person or group of persons, or as to  the
  character  or  kind  of the business and occupation of any person, firm,
  company or corporation, or own or conduct or maintain a bureau or agency
  for the above mentioned purposes, except exclusively as to the financial
  rating, standing, and credit responsibility of persons, firms, companies
  or  corporations,  or  as  to  the   personal   habits   and   financial
  responsibility   of   applicants   for  insurance,  indemnity  bonds  or
  commercial credit or of claimants under insurance policies, provided the
  business so exempted does not embrace other activities as  described  in
  section seventy-one of this article, or except where such information is
  furnished  or  supplied  by  persons  licensed  under  the provisions of
  section twenty-four-a or subdivision three-b of  section  fifty  of  the
  workers'  compensation  law  or  representing  employers  or  groups  of
  employers insured under the  workers'  compensation  law  in  the  state
  insurance  fund,  without  having  first obtained from the department of
  state, as hereafter provided, a license so to do as private investigator
  for each such bureau or agency and for each and every sub-agency, office
  and branch office to be owned, conducted, managed or maintained by  such
  persons, firm, limited liability company, partnership or corporation for
  the conduct of such business. Nothing contained in this section shall be
  deemed to include the business of adjusters for insurance companies, nor
  public  adjusters  licensed  by the superintendent of financial services
  under the insurance law of this state.
4. Any person, firm, company, partnership or corporation who  violates
  any provision of this section shall be guilty of a class B misdemeanor.