New York AI Laws
An overview of AI-related legislation and regulatory frameworks in New York State and New York City.
Why New York Matters
New York has emerged as a regulatory bellwether for AI governance in the United States. New York City's Local Law 144, enacted in 2021 and effective as of January 2023, represents one of the first municipal regulations specifically targeting automated decision-making systems in employment contexts.
The law establishes precedent for transparency, bias auditing, and accountability requirements that other jurisdictions are likely to reference or replicate. Organizations deploying AI-driven hiring, promotion, or employment screening tools must understand these requirements, not just for New York compliance, but as a model for emerging regulations elsewhere.
New York's approach emphasizes human oversight, third-party validation, and public disclosure, principles that align directly with the architectural design of Adaptive Intelligence Layers.
AI-Related Laws and Regulations
NYC Local Law 144 (2021)
Requires annual bias audits and disclosure notices for automated employment decision tools (AEDTs) used by employers or employment agencies in New York City.
Key Requirements:
- •Annual independent bias audit for race/ethnicity and sex categories
- •Public disclosure of audit results
- •Notice to candidates and employees when AEDTs are used
- •Alternative selection process or accommodation options
Effective Date: January 1, 2023
New York AI Synthetic Media & Disclosure Law
Requires clear disclosure when AI-generated or synthetic performers, voices, or human likenesses are used in advertising or other commercial content in New York. The law applies when AI-generated representations are used in place of real people and is intended to protect consumer transparency and prevent deceptive practices.
Key Requirements:
- •Disclosure when AI-generated or synthetic performers are used in advertisements or commercial media
- •Disclosure when AI-generated voices, avatars, or human representations replace real individuals
- •Clear, conspicuous notice to consumers regarding synthetic content
- •Applicability to marketing, advertising, and promotional use cases
Effective Date: Effective upon enactment
New York Identity, Likeness & Posthumous Consent Law
Requires explicit consent before using an individual's name, image, voice, or likeness for commercial purposes, including AI-generated or synthetic recreations. The law extends right-of-publicity protections to cover AI-based representations and applies to both living individuals and, for a defined period, deceased persons. Its purpose is to protect personal identity, consent, and dignity in the use of AI-generated media.
Key Requirements:
- •Consent required for commercial use of an individual's name, image, voice, or likeness, including AI-generated representations
- •Explicit authorization required for AI recreations of deceased individuals
- •Time-bound posthumous protections extending rights after death
- •Applicability to advertising, media, promotional, and commercial use cases
- •Restrictions on unauthorized AI-generated likenesses
Effective Date: Effective upon enactment
NYC Automated Decision Systems Oversight & Enforcement
Establishes oversight, reporting, and accountability expectations for the use of automated decision systems by New York City agencies. Rather than introducing a single new AI statute, this framework emphasizes ongoing governance, documentation, auditability, and transparency in how automated and AI-assisted systems are deployed, monitored, and reviewed within government operations. The focus is on demonstrable governance processes, not one-time compliance.
Key Requirements:
- •Documentation of automated decision systems used by agencies
- •Ongoing monitoring and review of algorithmic systems
- •Auditability of system inputs, outputs, and decision logic
- •Reporting mechanisms to support internal oversight and public accountability
- •Enforcement pathways when governance or transparency requirements are not met
Effective Date: Effective upon enactment / Ongoing governance requirement
How Adaptive Intelligence Layers Supports New York Compliance
Intent Layer
Determines whether content use is commercial and subject to disclosure requirements, whether use of identity or likeness is commercial and subject to consent requirements, and whether a system qualifies as an automated decision system subject to oversight and reporting obligations, ensuring the system understands when New York synthetic media, consent rules, and governance expectations apply before processing begins.
Context Layer
Detects AI-generated, synthetic, or reconstructed human representations in content, use of names, images, voices, or likeness-based representations, and system deployment contexts that trigger oversight obligations, providing the system with the contextual awareness needed to trigger appropriate disclosure, consent, and governance logic.
Governance Layer
Enforces bias detection protocols, audit trail requirements, and human oversight mechanisms for employment decisions, encodes New York disclosure obligations for synthetic media into enforceable policy logic, encodes consent, authorization, and posthumous protection rules into enforceable policy logic, and encodes oversight and reporting expectations into enforceable governance policies across AI systems before automated decisions are executed.
Execution Layer
Enforces disclosure and approval requirements before content is published, prevents unauthorized generation, publication, or deployment of protected representations, and ensures governance and oversight requirements are enforced at the point of execution rather than relying on post-hoc validation.
Adaptation Layer
Updates governance logic as disclosure rules, identity and consent laws, and oversight expectations evolve, enabling systems to maintain compliance without full redeployment as New York regulations are refined or expanded.
Verification Loop
Maintains continuous, auditable records of system behavior, decisions, overrides, and outcomes to support regulatory review and enforcement. Records decisions, disclosures, consent, authorization actions, and governance events to support audit and regulatory review, creating a persistent evidentiary record suitable for bias audits, synthetic media disclosure verification, consent verification, oversight reporting, regulatory inquiries, and third-party validation as required under New York law.
Quant Vault
Serves as the evidentiary and reference layer, retaining governance artifacts, audit logs, documentation, and validated references that support transparency and accountability over time. Provides a persistent repository for oversight evidence, enabling internal review, public reporting, and regulatory examination as required under New York's oversight framework.
Jurisdiction-Aware Governance
Adaptive Intelligence Layers can apply jurisdiction-specific governance rules when operating in New York City contexts while maintaining distinct configurations for other regulatory environments, supporting multi-jurisdiction deployments within a unified architecture.
Need help navigating New York AI compliance requirements?
Schedule a consultation to discuss how Adaptive Intelligence Layers can help you build governance-first AI systems that adapt to New York's regulatory landscape.
Schedule a Consultation