California just restricted AI workplace monitoring: what AB 1883, AB 1331 and SB 947 mean for employers

On September 30, 2026, California signed three workplace laws. AB 1883 bans AI surveillance tools that infer emotions or collect neural data. AB 1331 bans surveillance in workplace bathrooms. SB 947 requires a human to review automated discipline and firing decisions from July 1, 2027.

This guide to California AB 1883, AB 1331 and SB 947 covers what each law requires, whether monitoring software is covered, and a 30-day plan, with every legal statement linked to the chaptered bill text. Last checked October 7, 2026.

What did California sign on September 30, 2026?

All three were approved and filed on September 30, 2026 (Office of the Governor). AB 1883 and AB 1331 take effect on January 1, 2027 as non-urgency statutes (Article IV, Section 8(c) of the California Constitution); SB 947 becomes operative on July 1, 2027.

Law	What it does	Effective date	Penalty
AB 1883 (Bryan), Chapter 853, Statutes of 2026	Bars workplace surveillance tools that use artificial intelligence to recognize or infer an employee's emotional state, or to collect neural data	January 1, 2027	Up to $500 per violation
AB 1331 (Elhawary), Chapter 851, Statutes of 2026	Bars using a workplace surveillance tool to monitor employees in a workplace bathroom unless a court orders it	January 1, 2027	Up to $500 per violation
SB 947 (McNerney), Chapter 859, Statutes of 2026, known as the No Robo Bosses Act	Bars relying solely on an automated decision system for discipline or termination; requires human corroboration, data access and a written post-use notice	July 1, 2027	$500 per violation

The Labor Commissioner or a public prosecutor enforces all three, and none of them preempts a local ordinance that protects employees more.

What does AB 1883 ban, and what does it still allow?

AB 1883 bans one practice: using a workplace surveillance tool that uses artificial intelligence on employees to recognize, or make inferences or predictions about, an individual's emotional state, or to collect neural data (Labor Code section 1581). Two definitions in section 1580 set its reach:

A workplace surveillance tool is any system, application, instrument or device that collects employee data, activities, communications, actions, biometrics or behaviors by means other than direct observation by a person, including video or audio surveillance, continuous incremental time-tracking tools and geolocation.
Neural data is information generated by measuring the activity of an employee's central or peripheral nervous system, not inferred from non-neural information.

It still allows a tool used to ensure safety and any tool that doesn't meet those specifications (section 1581(b)), so a monitoring tool without artificial intelligence, or an AI tool that doesn't infer emotions or collect neural data, is outside the ban. Public employers and labor contractors are covered. The penalty is up to $500 for each violation (section 1582), and aerospace and national security work required by federal law or contract is exempt (section 1583).

What does AB 1331 require?

AB 1331 bars an employer from using a workplace surveillance tool to monitor or surveil employees in a bathroom located in the workplace, unless a court order directs it (Labor Code section 1561). It uses AB 1883's definition of a surveillance tool, minus smoke and carbon monoxide detectors and weapon detection systems. In practice:

Employees may leave tools behind when entering a bathroom, such as handheld scanners or phones with tracking apps, unless federal or existing state law requires them to remain available during meal or rest periods.
Entry and exit checks are allowed: an employer may check tools for the one-time entry and exit of a bathroom.
Badges and personal alarms can stay if an employee brings them voluntarily or a policy requires them for identification, safety or access to a locked bathroom, provided they don't detect or record audio or video and have no embedded or attached artificial intelligence.

Enforcement mirrors AB 1883: up to $500 for each violation (section 1563) and the same federal exemption (section 1565). Labor Code section 435, which bars audio or video recording in restrooms and changing rooms, still applies.

What does SB 947 change for AI-assisted reviews and firing?

From July 1, 2027, SB 947 regulates how an employer uses an automated decision system (ADS) in discipline and termination decisions (Labor Code sections 1520 to 1526.7). An ADS is a computational process derived from machine learning, statistical modeling, data analytics or artificial intelligence that issues a simplified output, such as a score, classification or recommendation, used to assist or replace human discretionary decision-making; spam filters, firewalls, antivirus software, calculators and databases are excluded. The rules, in sections 1522 and 1524:

Three prohibited uses: violating labor, safety, employment or civil rights laws, inferring an employee's protected status, or predicting and punishing the exercise of legal rights.
No sole reliance. An employer may not rely solely on an ADS for a disciplinary or termination decision.
Human corroboration. If the employer relies primarily on ADS output, a human must corroborate the decision with the underlying data or other information, such as supervisory evaluations, personnel files, work product, peer reviews or witness interviews. Output that can't be corroborated, or that the reviewer finds inaccurate, incomplete or misleading, can't be used.
Data access and notice. The employee may request a meaningful, objective description of their own data the ADS used, and when the employer announces the decision it must give a written, stand-alone, plain-language notice stating that it primarily relied on an ADS, that a human reviewed and corroborated the output, who to contact, and that retaliation is prohibited.

The civil penalty is $500 per violation, and once an ADS is shown to have been used, the employer must demonstrate that it didn't primarily rely on it or that it complied (section 1526.1). Collective bargaining agreements that explicitly waive the part are exempt, CCPA-covered businesses also follow the California Privacy Protection Agency's automated decision-making rules, and the federal aerospace and defense exemption applies (sections 1526.4 to 1526.6).

The text doesn't mention performance reviews. AI-generated summaries, ratings or recommendations that a manager reads and decides on are not banned; the duties apply when a disciplinary or termination decision rests solely or primarily on such output.

Do these laws cover employee monitoring software?

The definition covers most of it; the rules reach only part of it. The surveillance-tool definition shared by AB 1883 and AB 1331 names continuous incremental time-tracking tools and geolocation, so time tracking, activity monitoring and location apps fit it. The prohibitions are narrower:

AB 1883 reaches a monitoring tool only if it uses artificial intelligence to infer emotional state or collect neural data.
AB 1331 matters for handheld devices, phones with tracking apps, wearables and location tracking that could follow employees into a workplace bathroom, not for software on an office computer.
SB 947 applies to an ADS whose output drives a discipline or termination decision; productivity scores, ratings and flags from an analytics tool can be that output if an employer uses them that way, so the review, data access and notice duties fall on the employer's process.

Other California rules, such as the CCPA's notice at collection for covered businesses, continue to apply to monitoring itself; the employee monitoring laws by state guide covers them.

What Intelogos captures, and what it doesn't

Intelogos is a workforce analytics platform that shows how work time is spent across apps and websites, without screenshots or keystroke logging, and lets managers ask questions about it in plain language. Its agents record application and website usage, window titles, whether keyboard and mouse input happened or the device was idle, work hours and device details such as IP address and time zone (privacy policy). Intelogos doesn't take screenshots. Intelogos doesn't record what people type; it records only whether keyboard or mouse input happened. It doesn't capture webcam images or audio, doesn't infer emotions or emotional state and doesn't collect neural data. Window titles and URLs may still contain sensitive details, such as an email subject line.

That data fits the bills' broad definition of a workplace surveillance tool, while AB 1883's prohibition covers only tools that use artificial intelligence to infer emotional state or collect neural data, which Intelogos doesn't do. Employees can see their own data, depending on an account-wide setting (roles and access). Whether a specific deployment is covered by any of these laws is a question for counsel.

What should employers do in the next 30 days?

Employers have until January 1, 2027 for AB 1883 and AB 1331 and until July 1, 2027 for SB 947. A 30-day plan:

Inventory every monitoring and AI tool: what it collects, whether it uses artificial intelligence, whether it could infer emotions or collect biometric or neural data, where it operates and whether any output feeds discipline or termination decisions.
Ask vendors the five questions below and keep the answers in writing.
Update notices and policies. Describe each tool, add the bathroom rule for devices employees carry and draft the post-use notice SB 947 requires. The free employee monitoring policy template and consent form includes a policy template, a consent form and a state notice checklist updated for these laws.
Set up human review for automated decisions. Name the reviewers, list the corroborating information they must consult and adopt a rule that output that can't be corroborated isn't used.
Document it. Keep the inventory, vendor answers, review records and notices, and set up a way to answer an employee's request for their own data.

Have counsel review the result against the chaptered text and any local ordinance.

Five questions to ask any monitoring vendor

Does it infer emotions or mood? Sentiment scores, stress or burnout flags and engagement measures that claim to read feelings are the uses AB 1883 bans when artificial intelligence produces them.
Does it collect biometric or neural data? Face or voice recognition and wearables that read nervous system activity raise AB 1883 and Illinois's biometric law.
Does it record in private areas or through personal devices? Cameras, audio, location tracking and apps on phones employees carry into bathrooms are where AB 1331 applies; ask whether employees can leave the device behind.
Can employees see their own data? SB 947 gives employees a right to a description of the data an ADS used in a discipline or termination decision.
Which decisions does it automate, and how does a person review them? Ask which outputs are scores or recommendations, whether any action is taken automatically and what the reviewer sees; under SB 947 the employer, not the vendor, must show that a human corroborated the decision.

How does California compare?

Several jurisdictions already regulate automated employment decisions; among the laws below, only the European Union's rule and AB 1883 ban emotion inference at work. The employee monitoring laws by state guide covers the notice statutes.

Colorado. The 2024 Colorado Artificial Intelligence Act (SB 24-205) was delayed to June 30, 2026 by SB 25B-004 and then repealed and reenacted by SB 26-189, signed May 14, 2026, which applies to consequential decisions, including employment decisions, made on or after January 1, 2027, and requires deployers to explain adverse decisions within 30 days and offer correction of inaccurate data and meaningful human review.
Connecticut. Public Act 26-15 (Substitute Senate Bill 5), signed May 27, 2026, requires deployers of automated employment-related decision technology deployed on or after October 1, 2027 to give employees and applicants written notice before a hiring, promotion, discipline or discharge decision; decisions about scheduling or productivity monitoring are excluded. Conn. Gen. Stat. § 31-48d still requires written notice before electronic monitoring.
Illinois. Public Act 103-0804 (HB 3773), effective January 1, 2026, bars employers from using artificial intelligence that has the effect of discriminating on the basis of a protected class in hiring, promotion, discipline, discharge and other employment decisions, and requires notice to employees when it is used for those purposes.
New York City. Local Law 144 of 2021 bars using an automated employment decision tool to screen candidates for hiring or employees for promotion without an independent bias audit within the past year, a public summary and notice; the Department of Consumer and Worker Protection has enforced it since July 5, 2023.
Texas. HB 149, the Texas Responsible Artificial Intelligence Governance Act, effective January 1, 2026, bans developing or deploying an AI system with the intent to unlawfully discriminate against a protected class and restricts some government uses; it has no workplace-specific monitoring or emotion-inference rule.
European Union. Article 5(1)(f) of the EU Artificial Intelligence Act prohibits placing on the market or using AI systems to infer the emotions of a natural person in the workplace or in education institutions, except for medical or safety reasons, and has applied since February 2, 2025 (Article 113).

This is general information, not legal advice. Laws vary by location and change often; consult your own counsel before acting on it.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does AB 1883 ban employee monitoring?

No. It bans one use of a workplace surveillance tool: artificial intelligence that recognizes or infers an employee's emotional state, or that collects neural data (Labor Code section 1581). Safety uses and tools that do neither are outside the ban, so application, website and time tracking remain subject to the laws that already govern them. Whether a specific tool or deployment is covered is a question for counsel.

This is general information, not legal advice. Laws vary by location and change often; consult your own counsel before acting on it.

Does it cover remote workers in California?

None of the three laws mentions remote work. Each defines "employee" as any person employed by an employer; AB 1883 and SB 947 don't depend on where the employee works, and AB 1331 applies to "a bathroom located in the workplace", which the text doesn't define. Whether a home counts, and which law reaches a California resident working for an out-of-state employer, is a question for counsel.

What are the penalties?

AB 1883 and AB 1331 each carry a penalty of up to $500 for each violation (section 1582, section 1563); SB 947 carries a civil penalty of $500 per violation (section 1526.1). The Labor Commissioner or a public prosecutor enforces each law and can seek injunctive relief, punitive damages and attorney's fees in a civil action.

Does SB 947 ban AI performance reviews?

No. SB 947 restricts relying solely or primarily on an automated decision system for a disciplinary or termination decision. From July 1, 2027, a decision that relies primarily on such a system needs a human who corroborates it with the underlying data or other information, the employee can request a description of their data and must receive a written post-use notice, and an employer may not use such a system to infer protected status (Labor Code sections 1522 and 1524). AI-assisted reviews that a human reads and makes the decision on are not banned.

This is general information, not legal advice. Laws vary by location and change often; consult your own counsel before acting on it.

Sources

Every legal statement in this guide is based on the chaptered bill text or the official page below. All sources were checked on October 7, 2026.

California

AB 1883 bill text and status: Chapter 853, Statutes of 2026; approved by the Governor and filed with the Secretary of State on September 30, 2026; Labor Code sections 1580 to 1583.
AB 1331 bill text and history: Chapter 851, Statutes of 2026; approved and filed on September 30, 2026; Labor Code sections 1560 to 1565.
SB 947 bill text and status: Chapter 859, Statutes of 2026; approved and filed on September 30, 2026; Labor Code sections 1520 to 1526.7, operative July 1, 2027.
California Constitution, Article IV, Section 8: a non-urgency statute enacted at a regular session takes effect on January 1 following a 90-day period from its enactment.
Office of the Governor, September 30, 2026: the announcement of the signing of AB 1331, AB 1883 and SB 947.
Ogletree Deakins, "California Governor Signs 3 Bills Targeting AI and Workplace Surveillance", October 1, 2026: a law firm summary of the three bills, used as a secondary source.

Other jurisdictions

Colorado: SB 24-205, SB 25B-004 and SB 26-189 on the Colorado General Assembly's site, including the signed act of May 14, 2026, whose section 5 sets the January 1, 2027 effective date and applicability.
Connecticut: Substitute Senate Bill 5, Public Act 26-15 (bill status, signed May 27, 2026) and the act text, sections 7 to 12; Conn. Gen. Stat. § 31-48d.
Illinois: Public Act 103-0804 (HB 3773): the amendment to the Illinois Human Rights Act and the January 1, 2026 effective date.
New York City: Department of Consumer and Worker Protection, Automated Employment Decision Tools: Local Law 144 of 2021 and the July 5, 2023 enforcement date.
Texas: HB 149 history and enrolled text: the Texas Responsible Artificial Intelligence Governance Act, effective January 1, 2026.
European Union: Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 (EUR-Lex): Article 5(1)(f) and Article 113.

This is general information, not legal advice. Laws vary by location and change often; consult your own counsel before acting on it.