Senate Democrat targeting AI-based employment decisions, worker surveillance in new legislation

Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) introduced two new bills Thursday to target the use of artificial intelligence and surveillance technology in the workplace.

The Pennsylvania Democrat’s legislation would bar employers from relying exclusively on artificial intelligence to make hiring, firing, promotion and disciplinary decisions in the workplace and create a task force to study such automated decision systems, as well as workplace surveillance.

“Right now, there is nothing stopping a corporation from using artificial intelligence to hire, manage, or even fire workers without the involvement of a human being,” Casey said in a press release. 

“As robot bosses become more prevalent in the workplace, we have an obligation to protect working families from the dangers of employers misusing and abusing these novel technologies,” he added.

The No Robot Bosses Act, which Casey introduced alongside Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), would prohibit employers from solely using an automated decision system to make employment-related decisions, require regular testing for discrimination and biases in such systems and mandate independent, human oversight of their use.

A summary of the bill from Casey’s office pointed to several hypothetical scenarios in which job applicants and workers could be harmed by automated decision systems, such as a recruitment software automatically rejecting a resume over an employment gap or a tracking algorithm firing an employee without warning for not performing up to its standards.

Casey and Schatz were also joined by Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) in introducing the Exploitative Workplace Surveillance and Technologies Task Force Act Thursday, which would create a task force to study the use and impact of automated decision systems and workplace surveillance.