Does New York State have an AI hiring law?
This is the single most common factual error made about AI hiring rules in the United States, and it is made in both directions. New York City has a law. New York State is not the same jurisdiction, and the difference decides which of your candidates a notice workflow has to reach.
The short answer
Local Law 144 is a New York City ordinance. It is enforced by the New York City Department of Consumer and Worker Protection, a city agency, and DCWP has been enforcing it since July 5, 2023. As of August 26, 2026 there is no New York State statute imposing the same AEDT bias-audit and notice duties statewide.
New York City: jurisdiction and source status
- Jurisdiction
- New York City only — a municipal ordinance, not New York State law
- Law
- Local Law 144 of 2021, on automated employment decision tools (AEDT)
- Agency
- NYC Department of Consumer and Worker Protection (DCWP)
- Enforcement began
- July 5, 2023
- Core duties
- DCWP states that Local Law 144 prohibits employers and employment agencies from using an AEDT unless the tool has been subject to a bias audit within one year of its use, information about that audit is publicly available, and certain notices have been provided to employees or job candidates.
- Notice timing
- DCWP revised its roundtable materials in June 2023 to clarify that the notice must be provided 10 business days prior to use of an AEDT.
- Complaints
- Filed with DCWP; a complainant selects “Employment Agency” or “Other” as the business type, and no account is required.
- Last reviewed
- August 26, 2026
Why the confusion is so persistent
Three things feed it:
- The name. "New York" is the city and the state, and coverage of the law shortens to "New York's AI hiring law" almost immediately.
- Its prominence. Local Law 144 was first, so it became the reference point for how these laws work, and reference points get generalized.
- Genuine state-level activity. New York State legislators have been active on AI and employment, so "New York is legislating" is true at both levels while meaning different things.
Why it matters more than a naming quibble
Notice workflows are scoped by jurisdiction, and that scope decision gets made once and then applied to thousands of candidates. Get it wrong and the same mistake repeats on every one of them:
- Reading it as statewide means building a workflow around every New York candidate, and taking on volume and cost the law does not ask for.
- Reading it too narrowly means candidates for covered city positions do not get a notice the law does require.
Both are decided at configuration time, by whoever defines which candidates a rule covers, and both propagate silently.
The same trap, elsewhere
New York is the clearest case but not the only one. California's two regimes are both statewide, but they are administered by different agencies with different thresholds and dates, so "does California apply to us" has two answers. Illinois is statewide and singular, which makes it the simple one of the three.
One habit helps. When you write a rule down internally, record the jurisdiction the way the government does, naming the city, the state and the agency, rather than the shorthand everyone uses out loud.
What sits behind the boundary in practice
Once a jurisdiction is scoped, the workflow question is whether a given candidate falls inside it, and that resolves off candidate data: the work location, the role, the client site. Wherever that boundary is drawn, the same evidence question follows: for this candidate, on this date, under which approved template version, with what delivery outcome.
Common questions
Does New York State have an AI hiring law?
New York State has no statewide equivalent of New York City's Local Law 144 in force as of August 26, 2026. Local Law 144 is a New York City ordinance enforced by the city's Department of Consumer and Worker Protection.
So does Local Law 144 apply to a role in Buffalo or Albany?
Local Law 144 is a municipal ordinance covering positions in New York City. How it applies to a specific role, including remote and hybrid arrangements, is a legal question for your counsel. Location questions at the edges are exactly where this gets decided.
Why does this distinction matter operationally?
Because it determines which candidates a notice workflow has to cover. Treating a city ordinance as statewide means sending notices that are not required; treating it as narrower than it is means missing ones that are.
Is New York State legislating in this area?
New York State legislative activity on AI and employment continues, and the picture changes. What is in force is what these pages record; proposals are tracked separately on the pending legislation page.
Notice Tracking keeps approved templates, delivery events and exports connected to the candidate record.
This page is general information about published government requirements, last reviewed August 26, 2026. Requirements change; confirm the current text with the agency and your own counsel before relying on it.