2020Event location unknownHireVue
City AM and Cosmetics Business reported in March 2022, relaying the BBC Three documentary Computer Says No and the Times, that three make-up artists at MAC, an Estée Lauder Companies brand, lost their jobs in a 2020 redundancy process after being told to reapply for their roles through a video interview run by HireVue and marked by an algorithm. City AM reports that they were made redundant partly as a result of the automated judgement. The women said no one could explain how they had been scored, and one said nobody watched the video. Estée Lauder settled their claims out of court; the amount was not disclosed. The company says staff were told in advance about the HireVue skills assessment, that the process was used in tandem with human decision-making, that facial recognition made up about 0.25% of the overall assessment and performance data and qualitative feedback most of it, and that any suggestion facial recognition played a decisive role is false. HireVue said its video-analysis component had been discontinued about two years earlier. How much the HireVue score weighed in each decision is not reported.
Contextual tracker case Medium reported severity
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution disputed · 2 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 22/10/2026
2023ChinaUnidentified voice-cloning tool
Sixth Tone reported on 10 July 2026 that a voice actor in Jiangsu province, who narrates film-explainer videos on Douyin, has found voices that sound like his narrating videos he never recorded since 2023, including sports news, product promotions, conspiracy theories and swearing. According to the report, sellers offer what sounds like his voice in downloadable packages and editing apps let users select it and generate new recordings from text. He says that by 2024 former collaborators stopped hiring him and turned to AI-generated voices, others offered to use an AI version of his voice at a much lower rate, and his household income no longer covered living costs. From 2025, platforms flagged some of his real recordings as AI-generated, which could cut his clients' views and earnings, and he has had to record videos proving that he is human. Friends and relatives asked to borrow money, uploaders mostly ignored his requests and some abused him, and he describes fury, helplessness and lost sleep. He has taken the matter to court; Sixth Tone says he would need to show that the synthetic voice derives from his recordings, which lawyers said could require forensic voice analysis. The account is the actor's, relayed by one outlet; no court finding is reported.
Core concern Medium reported severity
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 22/10/2026
Jun 2025 to Aug 2025AustraliaUnidentified chatbot
A senior software developer employed for more than 11 years by Fujifilm Data Management Solutions in Australia was dismissed for serious misconduct on 7 August 2025 after a workplace bullying complaint escalated into a stream of complaint emails to managers. In [2026] FWC 835 (18 March 2026) the Fair Work Commission recorded that he agreed he relied on an AI large language model to prepare the emails, found that drafts were generated by AI, and recorded managers' unchallenged evidence that he appeared to consult ChatGPT during meetings. It found the emails inappropriate, combative and disproportionate, and said his use of AI 'was counterproductive. It led to his demise', appearing to give him a false sense of security. Because he accepted responsibility, the tribunal did not treat the AI use as an excuse; it held the dismissal was not unfair and dismissed his application. A Full Bench refused permission to appeal on 2 July 2026.
Core concern Medium reported severity Lawsuit Dismissed
AI involvement supported · Causal attribution supported · 3 sources, 2 underlying accounts · Added 21/10/2026
2026United KingdomUnidentified AI teaching-monitoring agent
The Guardian reported on 28 September 2026 that teachers at Multiverse, a UK company that delivers apprenticeship training in computer and AI skills, said an AI monitoring system introduced in recent weeks had caused them severe stress. According to the report, the system analyses and scores transcripts of teachers' online classroom sessions, tags each instructor with a risk status and a percentage confidence score, writes comments on their work and alerts managers when it suspects something is wrong. Teachers who spoke to the Guardian anonymously said the AI monitoring had led managers to pull them up for suspected digressions when they were answering students' questions, that they now felt under continuous scrutiny for several hours a day, and that some staff were on edge, losing sleep and seeking therapy. Multiverse said the AI does not replace human judgment, that only human managers write performance reviews, that the system's most consequential action is to recommend a human review of a session, and that its introduction was announced in advance; it did not directly address the complaints about stress. The accounts are the teachers', relayed by one newspaper.
Contextual tracker case Low reported severity
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 21/10/2026
2026Event location unknownClaude (reported)
In a Reddit post on 20 October 2026, an associate product manager at a privately owned e-commerce business writes that a new manager, who joined about three months earlier, connected Claude to the company's content management system and Asana and now has every piece of the poster's work reviewed by it. The poster says Claude keeps hallucinating problems that are not there, that the manager does not check the work or read the team's comments, and that the poster has had to redo 500 SKUs and has redone an SKU task five times, so that a task that used to take three days has taken two weeks. The poster also says the manager wants the knowledge base and product pages changed to match Claude's account of the company's own products, which the poster says is wrong because the information comes from the manufacturers. The post does not quote Claude's output, and the manager's account is not recorded. The account is uncorroborated.
Contextual tracker case Low reported severity
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 2 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 21/10/2026
Event date unknownUnited KingdomUnidentified AI system
In a public post to r/LegalAdviceUK created on 16 October 2026, a worker at a small UK business writes that about three weeks earlier the owner began a redundancy consultation with HR input and told them they were the only person being considered for redundancy. At the first formal consultation they were told of a proposed alternative role with a pay increase. At the second consultation, held with the HR adviser, the poster said they wanted that role and were told it was no longer considered viable and that the work would instead be completed by AI. After a colleague in the two-person department resigned, the owner said the department would be removed entirely; the poster says the company is now advertising a junior role with a similar title whose duties include assisting AI tools. The poster says they are frightened of losing their income, feel forced out so the owner can hire cheaper labour, and have contacted Acas. Commenters say this may be a lawful redundancy. The account is the poster's alone; the employer is not identified and no employer statement was retrieved. No dismissal had taken effect at the time of the post.
AI relation unknown Low reported severity
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 20/10/2026
2025RussiaDeepSeek
A Moscow district court upheld an engineering company's dismissal of its head of sales for disclosing trade secrets, according to RAPSI and Pravo.ru reports of 27 July 2026. The grounds included uploading protected internal reports to the Chinese chatbot DeepSeek, forwarding company documents to her personal email and disclosing strategic information to a supplier. The court held that uploading trade secrets to DeepSeek is in itself a disclosure. She had sought a dismissal by mutual agreement and a contractual severance payment of 5 million roubles. The court rejected both, annulled a separate reprimand and awarded her compensation for moral harm. The decision was not yet final.
AI relation unknown Medium reported severity Lawsuit Dismissed
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 4 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 19/10/2026
Event date unknownIndiaUnidentified image and video tool
Police in the Chennai area arrested a man in early May 2026 who, according to their investigation as reported by the Times of India, DT Next and Daily Thanthi, used AI to turn a woman colleague's display pictures into obscene images and videos, posted them from a fake Instagram account in her name, and tagged the posts with her home location. A friend alerted the woman to the account; she complained to an all-women police station, and police traced the posts to a colleague's phone. Daily Thanthi reports that he admitted under questioning to making the images with AI after a workplace dispute. DT Next reports that the account and posts were blocked and that he was remanded in judicial custody. The AI tool is not identified, and the date the posts began is not reported.
Core concern High reported severity Criminal Charges
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 3 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 19/10/2026
2026Event location unknownUnidentified AI model
Times of Malta reported on 18 October 2026, from interviews with anonymous former gambling-sector employees, that iGaming companies are laying off staff as they turn to AI. One former designer, who says they lost their job earlier in 2026, says their team had been told to train an AI model to make design and brand-guideline decisions, presented as a tool to help designers, and that the company later decided the model was fit enough to replace around half of the design team, including those who trained it. The designer says there was no notice, that they were asked to resign later that day and that the severance was the bare minimum. The outlet omitted company names, and the workers said they had signed non-disclosure agreements. GamingMalta, the industry promotion foundation, told the outlet it sees talent being redeployed rather than replaced by AI, and the article notes that others pointed to search-engine changes and higher UK gambling taxes. The account is a single anonymous worker's, relayed by one outlet; the employer and where the job was based are not stated.
AI relation unknown Medium reported severity
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 19/10/2026
2023Event location unknownChatGPT (reported)
In three linked Bluesky posts on 18 October 2026, written in answer to another user's call for stories of short job tenures, a person writes that a man hired them on the strength of years of experience to work on his company's documentation and public-facing marketing copy, and that he then rejected their work day after day because ChatGPT had told him it was not good. The poster attributes ChatGPT's verdicts to hallucinated errors. The poster says that after they told him and the marketing manager at a Friday meeting that this could not continue and that they would leave unless their skills and experience were respected, they were out by Monday morning, fired by email, and that he had paid them for two months of work upfront. The poster dates the events to 2023. The posts do not quote ChatGPT's output or say how the poster knew what it said, and the employer's account is not recorded. The account is uncorroborated.
Contextual tracker case Low reported severity
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 3 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 19/10/2026
Oct 2026Event location unknownChatGPT Dot (reported)
In a public post to r/OpenAI created on 17 October 2026, a person who says their small retail team uses ChatGPT on a business subscription writes that they had started that week to use Dot, ChatGPT's assistant, by phone call, including to record and summarise meetings. During a recorded meeting with a store manager, the poster says, the assistant repeated what was being said aloud and then answered in the poster's own voice and cadence; asked why its voice was different, it apologised for slipping into a different voice, and later said it could not be the poster's voice. The poster writes that they and the manager were both freaked out and hung up, that they did not authorise it to clone their voice, and that it may have been a glitch or hallucination. A commenter says voice modes have mimicked users' voices before; the poster replies that they were not aware of this. The poster still recommends the product. The account is uncorroborated and no recording or vendor response is reported.
Core concern Low reported severity
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 18/10/2026
Event date unknownEvent location unknownUnidentified AI system
In a public post to r/cscareerquestions created on 17 October 2026, a person who says they joined a product company as an associate full-stack developer at the start of the year writes that, while still on probation, they were invited to a Microsoft Teams meeting 'regarding my employment' at which 17 staff were told that their roles were redundant because of AI and that they were no longer needed. The poster says they were writing the probation report due on the 23rd when it happened, that there was no prior hint, and that they feel upset, demotivated and frustrated. In replies the poster agrees with a commenter who suggests that AI was a cover for financial problems, and writes that the reasons given for sackings are not usually the real ones. The employer, its location and the date of the meeting are not stated, and the poster says they are not in the United States. The account is the poster's alone and uncorroborated; no employer statement was retrieved.
AI relation unknown Medium reported severity
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 18/10/2026
26 Dec 2024ChinaUnidentified AI data-collection system
A technology company in Beijing employed a worker from July 2009 as a data collector doing manual map-data collection. In early 2024 the company moved that work to automated data collection led by AI technology and abolished the worker's department and post, and on 26 December 2024 it terminated the worker's contract, citing a major change in the objective circumstances on which the contract was based. The worker applied for labour arbitration, and the arbitration commission found the dismissal unlawful, according to a typical case that the Beijing human resources and social security bureau released on 26 December 2025, as reported by China National Radio, China News Service and HK01. The commission said that introducing AI was the company's own business decision and lacked the unforeseeable and unavoidable character the contract-law provision requires, and that the company had shifted the business risk of technical change onto the worker.
AI relation unknown Medium reported severity Lawsuit Filed
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 3 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 17/10/2026
Event date unknownEvent location unknownChatGPT (reported)
In a public post to r/ChatGPT on 15 October 2026, a web developer and designer who builds and maintains websites and web apps for clients writes that they had just lost their best-paying client. The poster says the client, tired of paying for their services, made a full website and webshop with ChatGPT in what the client called a couple of hours, and then emailed to say the poster was no longer needed. In replies the poster says the new site was already live on a new server with the domain connected, that the shop had been reverse engineered without the client asking for the source code, and that in the poster's view the replacement is full of bugs. The poster says they understand the client wanting to save money. The client is not named and no statement from the client is available; the account is the poster's alone and uncorroborated.
AI relation unknown Low reported severity
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 16/10/2026
Jan 2025ChinaUnidentified AI quality-inspection tool
A technology company in Hangzhou, China, employed a worker to check the quality of answers produced by an AI large language model, at 25,000 yuan a month. In January 2025, citing the impact of AI technology on his project, it proposed moving him to an ordinary operations post at 15,000 yuan a month; when he did not agree, it notified him that his contract was terminated, according to a typical case released by the Hangzhou Intermediate People's Court on 28 April 2026 and reported by Hangzhou media and China National Radio. China National Radio, citing CCTV News, reports that the company told him only at arbitration that after a technical upgrade AI could do his inspection work. A labour arbitration panel and then two levels of court in Hangzhou found the termination unlawful and ordered compensation of more than 260,000 yuan. The court said that introducing AI to stay competitive is not in itself the kind of major change in objective circumstances that makes an employment contract impossible to perform, and that the pay-cut offer was not a reasonable proposal. The worker told CCTV that he had not found a suitable new job since the termination.
AI relation unknown Medium reported severity Lawsuit Filed
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 7 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 16/10/2026
31 Oct 2025SpainUnidentified AI design tool
A company that designs and manufactures industrial furnaces dismissed a mechanical draughtsman on 31 October 2025 for objective reasons, citing a fall in business and the introduction of new technologies in its engineering department, including a model-based-definition design method and artificial-intelligence tools. According to press reports of the judgment, the dismissal letter put the cost of the tool licences at 4,725 euros a year against his gross annual salary of 29,871 euros and argued that the saving exceeded 80%. The social section of the Tribunal de Instancia de Bilbao declared the dismissal unfair, finding that the company had proved neither its economic losses nor the real implementation of the tools: an employee trained on the new method testified that she had never worked with it, and an implementation report was dated June 2026, seven months after the dismissal. The company must choose between reinstating the worker and paying 12,330.56 euros in compensation, less the amount already paid; the court rejected his claims that the dismissal was void and for a higher job category. One outlet reports that four draughtsmen were dismissed in total. El Periódico, which reported the same judgment in August 2026, dates it to early June 2026 and quotes the dismissal letter's statement that the company had introduced new artificial-intelligence systems that automate technical tasks previously done by specialised staff. The judgment was not read, and whether it is final is not reported.
AI relation unknown Medium reported severity Lawsuit Ongoing
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 5 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 16/10/2026
Aug 2024Event location unknownUnidentified AI presentation and data-analysis tool
A legal officer at an insurance company, responsible for compliance audits and risk checks, uploaded a company audit-issues data table that she had compiled and processed to a third-party AI platform in July 2024, to help make presentations and analyse data. According to the court's account, she did so on the recommendation of company leadership. In August 2024 the company served her a notice terminating her labour contract for serious violation of its rules, arguing that as a compliance employee bound by a confidentiality agreement she had exposed internal audit material to a platform that collects and retains user data for model iteration. The Chaoyang District People's Court in Beijing ruled at first instance that the dismissal was unlawful: the company's rules did not prohibit third-party AI tools, it had given no training on their use, and it had not shown that the table was core confidential information or that any leak or loss occurred. The court revoked the termination notice, ordered the contract to continue and ordered the company to pay the employee's year-end bonus shortfall, performance pay and lost wages. Kuai Keji, citing China National Radio, reported the ruling on 13 October 2026 and Beijing Daily on 14 October; both say the judgment has taken effect. No source names the insurer or the AI platform.
AI relation unknown Medium reported severity Lawsuit Filed
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 3 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 15/10/2026
2025United StatesNiCE workforce management
Interpreters at LanguageLine Solutions told NPR (May 2026) and Capital & Main (September 2026) that after the company adopted NiCE workforce management software in 2025, which LanguageLine says forecasts volume and determines schedules and which, according to Capital & Main's account of a company spokesperson's email, is AI software, their hours were cut, shifts were split into fragments and unpaid involuntary time off arrived with little notice. NPR reports that one interpreter's LanguageLine income fell 18% from 2024 to 2025. LanguageLine attributes the disruption mainly to lower demand, acknowledged that schedules had been more unpredictable than normal, and says operations are back to normal.
Contextual tracker case Medium reported severity Media Coverage
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution disputed · 2 sources · Added 14/10/2026
3 Apr 2026United StatesTimpani
Angelique Russell, a former manager of data science at HCA Healthcare, sued the hospital chain in federal court in Tennessee on 15 July 2026 for retaliatory discharge. Her complaint alleges that she found that Timpani, an AI system whose daily census predictions help set nurse staffing, overwrote the data behind its predictions so that its staffing decisions could not be audited or reproduced; that HCA placed her on a performance improvement plan weeks after she raised this; and that HCA fired her on 3 April 2026, days after she escalated her concerns to its Director of Responsible AI and its compliance department. She says the performance reasons were pretextual. These are allegations; HCA had not formally responded in court when WIRED reported on the suit on 2 October 2026.
AI relation unknown Medium reported severity Lawsuit Filed
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 2 sources, 1 underlying account · Added 13/10/2026
Event date unknownUnited StatesTimpani
Nurses at HCA Healthcare, the largest US hospital chain, told WIRED, in an article published on 2 October 2026, that Timpani, an AI scheduling tool HCA co-developed with Palantir and has rolled out at about 130 of its 190 locations, assigns shifts that ignore their requests. A Florida critical care nurse said that over four months the tool gave her different shifts for more than half of the 50 she requested, often back-to-back days that left her mentally drained. A Missouri nurse said essentially every nurse at their facility had been assigned to work on a requested day off, and that they delayed a long-planned doctor's appointment for a chronic condition after struggling to trade such a day. HCA says nursing leaders, not Timpani, make final scheduling decisions and that the tool schedules nurses on about 1 percent of requested days off.
Contextual tracker case Low reported severity Media Coverage
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source · Added 13/10/2026