The New York State Department of Taxation and Finance recently released advisory opinion TSB-A-20(70)S, concluding that a taxpayer’s service of creating and hosting websites and applications (apps) for mobile devices is nontaxable. The taxpayer’s customers are retailers of consumer goods, and the customer’s users access the website or app to purchase items from the retailer. The taxpayer does not charge for website/app creation, and instead recovers its costs through the fixed monthly service fee it charges for website maintenance and hosting. The taxpayer embeds code in the websites/apps so that it can provide analytics services to each customer. The Department concluded that website development services, including consulting, designing, creation, and updating or hosting are not enumerated services subject to tax and do not involve the transfer of any prewritten computer software. The analytics the taxpayer provides are also not a taxable information service in New York, because the information is unique to each individual, and is not incorporated in reports provided to other clients.