# Governmental entities must not use AI for social scoring

- **Record type**: Obligation
- **Instrument**: Texas Responsible Artificial Intelligence Governance Act (HB 149, 89th Legislature)
- **Jurisdiction**: Texas (United States)
- **Category**: prohibited_practice
- **Binding**: Yes
- **Applies from**: 2026-01-01
- **Provision**: Business and Commerce Code Section 551.053

## What the duty requires

A governmental entity may not develop or deploy an AI system that evaluates or classifies natural persons or groups on the basis of their social behaviour or personal characteristics, with the intent to calculate or assign a social score or similar valuation that leads to detrimental or unfavourable treatment unrelated to the context in which the data was collected, or that is unjustified or disproportionate to the behaviour.

## What an organisation does about it

Screen agency scoring, eligibility and risk-ranking tools for social-scoring characteristics before procurement or build.

## Controls that meet this duty

- Prohibited and unacceptable-use screening gate (satisfies): https://aipolicytracker.org/controls/prohibited-use-screening-gate
- Public-sector AI use-case register and algorithmic transparency (supports): https://aipolicytracker.org/controls/public-sector-ai-use-case-register

## Parent instrument

- Texas Responsible Artificial Intelligence Governance Act (HB 149, 89th Legislature)
  - Record: https://aipolicytracker.org/policies/us-texas-responsible-ai-governance-act-traiga
  - Context file: https://aipolicytracker.org/policies/us-texas-responsible-ai-governance-act-traiga.md

## Provenance

- **Record page**: https://aipolicytracker.org/obligations/us-texas-responsible-ai-governance-act-traiga-government-social-scoring-prohibition
- **Official source**: https://capitol.texas.gov/BillLookup/History.aspx?LegSess=89R&Bill=HB149
- **Provision**: Business and Commerce Code Section 551.053
- **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.