California AB 1405 (Artificial intelligence: auditors: enrollment)

• Authority: California
• Parent authority: State governments
• Jurisdiction: United States
• Collections: U.S. state and local documents
• Most recent activity: Proposed
• Most recent activity date: 2025-08-29

Risk subdomain coverage

Minimal coverage — Brief mention but no specific mitigations, recommendations or governance measures relating to the risk subdomain are described.

• Governance failure
• Lack of capability or robustness
• Lack of transparency or interpretability

All other risk subdomains had no coverage in this document.

Risk Coverage Summary

The document has minimal coverage of risk domains, primarily addressing governance failure (6.5) through establishment of auditor oversight mechanisms. It indirectly touches on system safety and transparency (7.3, 7.4) by requiring audits against industry standards, but does not explicitly describe the risks themselves. The document focuses on governance infrastructure rather than specific AI risks.

Sector coverage

Minimal coverage — Brief mention but no specific mitigations, recommendations or governance measures relating to the sector are described.

• Professional & Technical Services

All other sectors had no coverage in this document.

Sectors Summary

This document does not govern AI use in specific economic sectors. Instead, it establishes governance infrastructure for AI auditors who conduct audits across all sectors. The Professional and Technical Services sector has minimal coverage as the document regulates the auditing profession itself.

Legislative Status

Hard Law

Legislative Status Summary

This is a binding California state statute with mandatory requirements, enforcement mechanisms, and legal obligations for AI auditors conducting covered audits.

Actors

Proposer

• Entity Types: AI_Governance_Actor
• Entities: California State Legislature; The people of the State of California
• Summary: The document is a California state statute enacted by the people of California through their legislature, as indicated by the opening phrase 'The people of the State of California do enact as follows.'

Target

• Entity Types: AI_Governance_Actor
• Entities: AI auditors; persons, partnerships, or corporations that assess AI systems or models on behalf of third parties
• Summary: The statute explicitly targets AI auditors who conduct covered audits of AI systems or models. These auditors must enroll with the agency, pay fees, and comply with various requirements including industry standards, conflict of interest prohibitions, and confidentiality rules.

Enforcer

• Entity Types: AI_Governance_Actor
• Entities: Government Operations Agency; Attorney General; Labor Commissioner; other state agencies
• Summary: The Government Operations Agency is designated to administer the chapter, manage enrollments, collect fees, and maintain misconduct reports. The Attorney General and Labor Commissioner are referenced as enforcement authorities for employee disclosures. Reports are shared with other state agencies for enforcement purposes.

Monitor

• Entity Types: AI_Governance_Actor
• Entities: Government Operations Agency; natural persons (public); employees of AI auditors
• Summary: The Government Operations Agency monitors enrolled AI auditors by maintaining a public registry, collecting misconduct reports from the public, and retaining reports for 10 years. Natural persons can report misconduct through the agency's website. Employees are protected when reporting auditor non-compliance.

AI Lifecycle Stages

Lifecycle stages covered by the documents, as defined in the OECD Framework for the Classification of AI Systems

• Verify and Validate
• Operate and Monitor

AI Lifecycle Summary

The document primarily covers the Verify and Validate stage through its focus on third-party auditing of AI systems and models. It also addresses Operate and Monitor by requiring auditors to assess compliance with industry standards and state law, and by establishing ongoing oversight mechanisms for auditor conduct.

Technical Scope

Terms relating to technical scope that are mentioned or implicitly referenced in the document

• AI Models
• AI Systems

Technical Scope Summary

The document explicitly mentions both AI systems and AI models as subjects of auditing. It does not specify particular types of AI (frontier, general purpose, task-specific, generative, predictive) or mention compute thresholds or open-weight models. The focus is on establishing auditor requirements rather than defining technical AI categories.