Personal rights: automated decision systems.

Existing law establishes the Department of Business Oversight in the Business, Consumer Services, and Housing Agency, headed by the Commissioner of Business Oversight. Under existing law, the department has charge of the execution of specified laws relating to various financial institutions and financial services. Existing law, the California Fair Employment and Housing Act, protects and safeguards the right and opportunity of all persons to seek, obtain, and hold employment without discrimination, abridgment, or harassment on account of race, religious creed, color, national origin, ancestry, physical disability, mental disability, medical condition, genetic information, marital status, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, age, sexual orientation, or military and veteran status. Existing law regulates the use of personal information, including the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018, which grants a consumer various rights with regard to personal information relating to that consumer that is held by a business. The act requires a business that collects personal information about a consumer to disclose the consumer's right to delete personal information in a form that is reasonably accessible to consumers and in accordance with a specified process. This bill would enact the Automated Decision Systems Accountability Act of 2020. The bill would require a business in California that provides a person, as defined, with a program or device that uses an automated decision system (ADS) to take affirmative steps to ensure that there are processes in place to continually test for biases during the development and usage of the ADS, conduct an ADS impact assessment on its program or device to determine whether the ADS has a disproportionate adverse impact on a protected class, as specified, examine if the ADS in question serves reasonable objectives and furthers a legitimate interest, and compare the ADS to alternatives or reasonable modifications that may be taken to limit adverse consequences on protected classes. The bill would require a business, by March 1, 2022, and annually thereafter, to submit a report to the Department of Business Oversight summarizing the results of its ADS impact assessment for each program or device that uses an ADS. The bill would also require a business, if it makes any significant modification to an ADS, to reconduct an ADS impact assessment under these circumstances. The bill would require the department, by January 1, 2022, to develop a procedure for businesses to use in making the required reports and to make general information on the reporting process available on its internet website. The bill would require the department, if a business fails to comply with these procedures, to send a written notice to the business regarding its failure to comply, and would require the business to submit the report within 60 days of the date of that notice. The bill would make violations of these provisions subject to a civil penalty. The bill would also require the department, by March 1, 2022, to establish an Automated Decision Systems Advisory Task Force, composed of various representatives from the public and private sectors, for the purpose of reviewing and providing advice on the use of automated decision systems in businesses, government, and various other settings.