HR Technology
Workday ordered to name customers who used AI hiring tech
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A US federal judge ruled that there may have been AI hiring bias among applicants who were screened by Workday’s talent management software.
A US federal court ruled last week that popular HR software Workday must reveal the names of employers that have implemented a controversial artificial intelligence tool in their recruitment processes.
The ruling by the US District Court of Northern California stems from a collective AI discrimination lawsuit that alleges the HiredScore AI, which Workday implemented in August 2024, discriminates against job applicants over the age of 40.
Presiding judge Rita Lin said the applicants ‘are alike in the central way that matters: they were allegedly required to compete on unequal footing due to Workday’s discriminatory AI recommendations.’
According to the lawsuit, the affected applicants said they received hundreds of rejection messages without job interviews from Workday, which is a violation of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA).
Workday claimed that HiredScore is a ‘separate product, built on a wholly separate technology platform’ that can run on any type of applicant tracking software, per the court documents. The company also noted that it would face ‘logistical hurdles’ in identifying the collective due to the number of applicants affected, and only individuals who were scored or ranked by its Candidate Skills Match technology should be included.
In response, Judge Lin said these challenges ‘do not appear insurmountable.’
“If the collective is in the ‘hundreds of millions’ of people, as Workday speculates, that is because Workday has been plausibly accused of discriminating against a broad swath of applicants. Allegedly widespread discrimination is not a basis for denying notice,” Lin ruled.
Workday also argued that the lawsuit should not be granted class-action status as it does not offer employment recommendations, and the policy in question is not uniformly applied to all applicants.
However, the court said that Workday’s website and the company’s responses during the discovery phase contradict its claim that it doesn’t recommend applicants. The court also noted that the proposed class only includes individuals whose applications were subject to Workday’s AI and that the plaintiff ‘is not required to prove that each member of the proposed collective is identically situated … his burden is to identify legal or factual similarities that are material to the resolution of the case.’
A Workday spokesperson says the company believes the HiredScore AI lawsuit is without merit and that their customers have ‘full control and human oversight of their hiring process.’
“Our AI capabilities look only at the qualifications listed in a candidate’s job application and compare them with the qualifications the employer has identified as needed for the job,” the spokesman added. “They are not trained to use — or even identify — protected characteristics like race, age, or disability. The court has already dismissed all claims of intentional discrimination, and there’s no evidence that the technology results in harm to protected groups.”
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