Senate Bill S1926 for An act concerning the use of automated tools to assist with hiring decisions was submitted, on 3 March 2022, to the New Jersey State Senate, and thereafter referred, on the same date, to the Senate Labour Committee. Specifically, the bill defines 'automated employment decision tool' as any system the function of which is governed by statistical theory, or systems the parameters of which are defined by systems, including inferential methodologies, linear regression, neural networks, decision trees, random forests, and other learning algorithms, which automatically filter candidates or prospective candidates for hire or for any term, condition, or privilege of employment in a way that establishes a preferred candidate or candidates.

In particular, the bill provides that the sale of automated employment decision tools is prohibited unless:

• the tool is the subject of a bias audit conducted in the past year prior to selling the tool or offering the tool for sale;
• the sale of the tool includes, at no additional cost, an annual audit service that provides the results of the audit to the purchaser; and
• the tool is sold or offered for sale with a notice stating that the tool is subject to the provisions of the bill.

Furthermore, the bill outlines that any person using an automated employment decision tool to screen candidates, must notify candidates within 30 days of use of the tool that:

• the automated employment decision tool, which is subject to an audit bias, was used in connection with the employment application; and
• the tool assessed the job qualifications or characteristics of the candidate.

Notably, the bill is a companion to Assembly Bill A4909, which was submitted, on 5 December 2022, to the New Jersey General Assembly.

You can read the bill here and track its progress here.