New York City bias audit law for hiring tools (2023)
A New York City rule that bans using an automated employment decision tool without a recent, independent and published bias audit.
A tool that screens applications learns from past decisions and can reproduce their gaps by sex or ethnicity, without the employer seeing it. The New York law does not ban the tool: it requires an annual audit by a third party, measuring selection rates by category, publication of its summary, and advance notice to candidates. The text set a template, the mandatory bias audit, that other jurisdictions have adopted or debated. For the employer's or vendor's liability insurer, the audit provides a measure of discrimination risk, but it offers no protection from a lawsuit under federal law, which judges the effect and not whether an audit exists.
Adopted in 2021, New York City Local Law 144 has been enforced since July 5, 2023, with fines of 500 to 1,500 dollars per violation.
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