Auditing Employment Algorithms for Discrimination

Algorithmic hiring systems are proliferating, and while some present opportunities to reduce systemic biases, others create new modes of discrimination. Broadly, the use of algorithms can enable fairer employment processes, but this is not guaranteed to be the case without meaningful standards. Algorithmic audits have been proposed as one such way to ensure those standards, and early examples of audits of algorithmic hiring systems have been released to the public. An examination of these audits and the relevant incentives demonstrates how algorithmic auditing will not produce accountability on its own.