# Employers and employment agencies must obtain an independent bias audit before using an automated employment decision tool

- **Record type**: Obligation
- **Instrument**: New York City Local Law 144 of 2021 on Automated Employment Decision Tools (AEDT) and DCWP implementing rules
- **Jurisdiction**: New York (United States)
- **Category**: accuracy_robustness_security
- **Binding**: Yes
- **Applies from**: 2023-07-05
- **Provision**: NYC Administrative Code Section 20-871(a)(1); 6 RCNY Section 5-301

## What the duty requires

An automated employment decision tool may not be used to screen candidates or employees for hiring or promotion in New York City unless it has been the subject of a bias audit by an independent auditor within the year before use. The audit calculates selection rates and impact ratios by sex, race/ethnicity and their intersections, and scoring-rate comparisons for tools that score rather than select, using the employer's historical data or, where insufficient, test data as the DCWP rules allow.

## What an organisation does about it

Commission an annual independent bias audit for each tool, supplying historical outcome data by protected category, and calendar the twelve-month expiry.

## Controls that meet this duty

- Accuracy, robustness, fairness and security testing (satisfies): https://aipolicytracker.org/controls/accuracy-robustness-security-testing
- Vendor and third-party AI due diligence (supports): https://aipolicytracker.org/controls/third-party-ai-due-diligence

## Parent instrument

- New York City Local Law 144 of 2021 on Automated Employment Decision Tools (AEDT) and DCWP implementing rules
  - Record: https://aipolicytracker.org/policies/us-new-york-city-local-law-144-automated-employment-decision-tools
  - Context file: https://aipolicytracker.org/policies/us-new-york-city-local-law-144-automated-employment-decision-tools.md

## Provenance

- **Record page**: https://aipolicytracker.org/obligations/us-new-york-city-local-law-144-bias-audit
- **Official source**: https://www.nyc.gov/site/dca/about/automated-employment-decision-tools.page
- **Provision**: NYC Administrative Code Section 20-871(a)(1); 6 RCNY Section 5-301
- **Review status**: pending review
- **Confidence**: high
- **Facts last confirmed**: never confirmed against the official source
- **Retrieved**: 2026-09-24
- **Licence**: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

> This record is a structured summary with a link to the official text. It is not legal advice. Open the official source before relying on any date or duty. How current each record type must be is published at https://aipolicytracker.org/verification; what a record must carry at all is published at https://aipolicytracker.org/coverage.