Starting Jan. 1, 2027, California employers won't be allowed to use AI-powered surveillance tools to read workers' emotions or collect their brain data. That's the core of Assembly Bill 1883, which Gov. Gavin Newsom signed on Sept. 30. KQED reports it was one of five labor-backed bills on AI in the workplace that he signed at the end of September.
What the law says
According to the chaptered bill text, an employer "shall not use a workplace surveillance tool that uses artificial intelligence on employees" to recognize or make inferences or predictions about a person's emotional state, or to collect neural data, meaning measurements of nervous-system activity. Surveillance tools covered include video and audio monitoring, continuous time-tracking, geolocation and electromagnetic tracking. Tools used to ensure safety are still allowed, and some federal aerospace and defense work is exempt. Public employers are covered too, including cities, school districts, transit districts and the University of California.
Enforcement
The state Labor Commissioner and public prosecutors can investigate and sue. Penalties run up to $500 per violation, according to the bill text and an Oct. 6 analysis by the law firm Hunton Andrews Kurth.
What it could mean on the job
KQED spoke with a Kaiser Permanente telephone triage nurse who said she found a "sentiment score" attached to her recorded calls. A Kaiser spokesperson told KQED the company does not currently use AI tools to recognize or infer nurses' emotional states and is reviewing what AB 1883 means for its operations. Management-side employment attorney Anthony Zaller told KQED that scoring "whether someone said the right words" is fine, but scoring "what they were feeling now is off limits." Another bill in the package, AB 1979, bars health facilities from letting AI alone do work reserved for licensed professionals.