Victoria moves to curb workplace AI and biometric surveillance

The Australian state of Victoria plans to introduce legislation that would place limits on employers’ use of AI and biometric monitoring. Biometric data could only be collected when a less intrusive method cannot achieve the same purpose.

The proposed protections could cover technologies that employers use to monitor and manage workers. These include facial recognition used for workplace access, fingerprint time clocks, emotion and attention recognition systems, keystroke monitoring and screen recording.

“Workers are telling us that surveillance is used to monitor toilet breaks, conversations with co-workers, to hit unreasonable targets and watch workplace movements,” Victorian Trades Hall Council secretary Luke Hilakari told InnovationAus.com.

AI-based surveillance and automated systems would face these safeguards when used in recruitment, promotion, pay or workplace management, especially if they could discriminate on the basis of race, gender, sexuality, and religion. The proposed legislation would give workers the required visibility into how employers monitor them and use their biometric data.

Hilakari told InnovationAus.com that about 81 percent of workers who reported being surveilled were not included in discussions with their employer. But under the proposed legislation, employers would have to inform workers when, why, and how they are being monitored. They would also have to consult employees before introducing a new surveillance system.

The measures remain a proposed legislative package and have not yet been enacted into law.

This follows a parliamentary inquiry into whether Victoria’s existing privacy and surveillance laws are sufficient for modern workplace technologies. The committee concluded that workplace monitoring had become cheaper and more pervasive, while the existing laws had failed to keep pace with the technologies available to employers.

Earlier this month, U.S. senators introduced two bills that would limit workplace surveillance and employers’ dependence on automated decision-making. The Stop Spying Bosses Act would cover data including productivity and break information, communications, precise location, sensor data, behavioral inferences and biometric identifiers.

This comes in the wake of Meta tracking keystrokes and mouse movements on the work computers of U.S. employees. Employees raised concerns about the monitoring and the lack of an opt-out.

Even Türkiye’s Personal Data Protection Board had ruled that fingerprints and facial recognition were disproportionate for recording employee working hours when alternative systems were available. The regulator said employee consent was not necessarily sufficient.

Article Topics

Australia  |  biometric monitoring  |  biometrics  |  Victoria  |  workforce management