Since entering office in January, the Trump administration has begun rolling back federal agency actions meant to protect workers from harmful digital surveillance, a new Government Accountability Office (GAO) report found.
Surveying a group of 11 organizations made up of trade associations, advocacy organizations, and research organizations, GAO said protections established in the last few years have disappeared or been removed from federal websites and guidance. The report is also based on a review of 122 studies that meet GAO’s standards.
Digital surveillance tools that help employers keep track of information on their employees to improve operations include cameras, microphones, computer monitoring software, geolocation trackers, phone applications, and wearable devices, GAO said.
While those tools have benefits – such as monitoring employees’ heart rates and reminding them to take a break, or increasing workers’ sense of safety – they also come with risks to staff’s physical and mental health and can impact employment opportunities, the report found.
Those surveyed reported increased risk of injury by pushing workers to move faster to meet productivity metrics – which can sometimes be inaccurate – and increase stress and anxiety, which can be increased by employers’ transparency on data collection.
It can also impact women, those with disabilities, and communities of color more so than other employees by resulting in low performance evaluations, decreased pay, disciplinary actions, or terminations.
Citing a study, GAO said the digital surveillance tools “could feed into employers’ existing stereotypes about women’s behavior in the workplace,” and then be used as “justification for firing female workers while shielding themselves from potential discrimination claims.”
Emotional monitoring technology may also “disproportionately misidentify workers of some races as expressing negative emotions,” GAO added.
Several federal agencies are tasked with investigating unfair employer practices, including some relating to digital surveillance, though GAO noted that agencies don’t track which cases involve the use of digital surveillance.
Policies and guidance developed over the last few years to mitigate digital surveillance risks “have either rescinded these past efforts or are currently reviewing them to ensure that they align with the current administration’s priorities,” GAO said.
As an example, GAO pointed to a memo issued by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in 2022 that found digital surveillance may restrict workers’ right to organize. However, that guidance was later rescinded in February as part of “an initiative to refocus resources on the agency’s core mission,” according to NLRB officials.
Best practices for worker well-being published by the Department of Labor (DOL) last October specifically covered the use of artificial intelligence monitoring, which was removed in January from its website to align with the Trump administration’s priorities.
Guidance for workers with disabilities and limiting discrimination against those employees was also removed from the DOL and Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) websites for the same reason.
“In May 2023, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) had requested information from the public – including private and public sector workers – to better understand the prevalence, uses, purposes, and deployment of automated digital surveillance tools, including effects of these tools on workers’ physical and mental health, privacy, and ability to exercise workplace rights,” GAO said, adding that “as of July 2025, the responses are no longer available on OSTP’s website.”