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Research report ยท October 2026 edition

Lawsuits, Regulation and Labour Actions in AI Training Work

From 1 Jan 2023 to 31 Oct 2026, 35 lawsuits, rulings, investigations, laws and labour actions concerned the people who train AI; Scale AI is named in the most.

Read the month's story: The AI Training Job Market in October 2026

Provisional figures. This month is complete, but late data can still arrive until 3 Nov 2026, when the edition is frozen for good.

Covers
10 Jan 2023 to 31 Oct 2026
Events by the date they happened
Computed
1 Nov 2026, 01:17 UTC
Final once frozen
Source
Court records, agency announcements, official journals and reporting by major outlets, each linked beside its event.
Method
Version 1. Definitions
CC BY 4.0, how to cite

Every figure on this page as CSV and JSON, sent to your work email.

Key findings

  1. 1

    8 lawsuits over the pay, classification or treatment of AI data workers were filed from 1 Jan 2023 to 31 Oct 2026; the latest step in any case was on 22 Oct 2026 (Boggs v. Stryder Corp.: case stayed pending mediation).

    Figure 1
  2. 2

    8 laws or regulatory steps touch this work, the latest on 19 Aug 2026: Kenya National Assembly passes outsourcing-liability amendments.

    Figure 1
  3. 3

    9 labour actions and layoffs of AI raters, tutors or annotators are recorded, the latest on 12 Sep 2025 (xAI lays off about 500 data annotators (generalist AI tutors)).

    Figure 1
  4. 4

    Scale AI is named in the most events (10: lawsuit, settlement, layoff and investigation).

    Figure 3
  5. 5

    2025 has the most events so far (13).

    Figure 2

Figure 1

Lawsuits, rulings, investigations, regulation and labour actions

What legal and regulatory events concern the people who train AI, and where do they stand?

EventDateKindStatus
Boggs v. Stryder Corp.: case stayed pending mediationU.S. District Court, N.D. Cal. (via CourtListener RECAP)22 Oct 2026LawsuitStayed pending mediation on 4 Feb 2027; joint status report due 5 Feb 2027; no ruling on the merits (as of 22 Oct 2026)
AI trainer misclassification suits: Bloomberg Law counts at least six pendingBloomberg Law29 Sep 2026LawsuitReported as pending on 29 Sept 2026 (as of 29 Sep 2026)
Kenya National Assembly passes outsourcing-liability amendmentsBusiness Day19 Aug 2026RegulationAwaiting presidential assent (as of 25 Sep 2026)
Schuster v. Scale AI: voluntary dismissalU.S. District Court, N.D. Cal. (via CourtListener RECAP)10 Aug 2026LawsuitDismissed by plaintiffs (with prejudice as to named plaintiffs, without prejudice as to the putative class) (as of 10 Aug 2026)
McKinney v. Scale AI: $12.5 million class settlement (preliminary approval)McKinney v. Scale AI settlement website (Simpluris, settlement administrator)24 Jul 2026SettlementPreliminarily approved; opt-out and objection deadline was 3 Sept 2026; final approval hearing was set for 30 Oct 2026; no ruling found by 31 Oct 2026 (the settlement site still says the court has not decided) (as of 31 Oct 2026)
Digital Omnibus on AI delays AI Act high-risk requirements, including Article 10EUR-Lex (Official Journal of the European Union)24 Jul 2026RegulationIn force (as of 24 Jul 2026)
Boggs v. Stryder Corp. (Handshake AI worker classification class action)U.S. District Court, N.D. Cal. (via CourtListener RECAP)20 Jul 2026LawsuitStayed on 22 Oct 2026 pending a mediation set for 4 Feb 2027 (see next record); no ruling on the merits (as of 22 Oct 2026)
White v. Mercor.io (worker classification class action)U.S. District Court, N.D. Texas (via CourtListener)8 May 2026LawsuitPending: amended complaint filed 25 Jun 2026; the last filing on the public docket is dated 31 Jul 2026; no ruling found (as of 31 Oct 2026)
Deboni v. Mercor.io and related suits (March 2026 data incident)U.S. District Court, N.D. California (via CourtListener)1 Apr 2026LawsuitStay pending mediation stipulated on 20 Jul 2026; the last filing on the public docket is dated 21 Jul 2026; no ruling found (as of 31 Oct 2026)
California AB 2013 training data transparency law takes effectCrowell & Moring LLP1 Jan 2026RegulationIn effect (as of 8 Dec 2025)
xAI lays off about 500 data annotators (generalist AI tutors)TechCrunch12 Sep 2025LayoffCarried out (reported) (as of 13 Sep 2025)
EU AI Act general-purpose AI obligations apply (training content summary)EUR-Lex (Official Journal of the European Union)2 Aug 2025RegulationApplicable (as of 10 Oct 2026)
GlobalLogic lays off more than 200 Google AI ratersWIREDAug 2025LayoffCarried out (reported); NLRB complaints filed, outcome not found (as of 15 Sep 2025)
European Commission template for public summary of AI training contentEuropean Commission (Shaping Europe's digital future)24 Jul 2025RegulationPublished (as of 24 Jul 2025)
Scale AI cuts 14% of staff and 500 contractorsTechCrunch16 Jul 2025LayoffCarried out (as of 16 Jul 2025)
Surge AI worker classification class action (Cavalier)Bloomberg Law20 May 2025LawsuitFiled; no ruling or settlement found (as of 21 May 2025)
Department of Labor drops Scale AI investigation (reported)TechCrunch9 May 2025InvestigationClosed (reported) (as of 9 May 2025)
Global Trade Union Alliance of Content Moderators launchedUNI Global Union30 Apr 2025Labour actionLaunched (as of 30 Apr 2025)
Schuster v. Scale AI: defendants move to compel arbitrationU.S. District Court, N.D. Cal. (via CourtListener RECAP)2 Apr 2025LawsuitHearing reset to 23 Sept 2025; no ruling on the motion found before the plaintiffs' voluntary dismissal (as of 10 Aug 2026)
US Department of Labor FLSA investigation of Scale AITechCrunch6 Mar 2025InvestigationOngoing at the time; reported closed in May 2025 (see next record) (as of 6 Mar 2025)
Alphabet Workers Union NLRB charge against GlobalLogic (rater pay discussion)Fortune (Bloomberg)18 Feb 2025Labour actionFiled; outcome not found (as of 18 Feb 2025)
Schuster v. Scale AI (psychological harm class action)TechCrunch17 Jan 2025LawsuitVoluntarily dismissed by the plaintiffs on 10 Aug 2026 (see separate record) (as of 10 Aug 2026)
Rogowicz v. Scale AI (PAGA wage and classification claim)TechCrunch3 Jan 2025LawsuitFiled; no later source found that states this case's outcome (as of 9 Jan 2025)
McKinney v. Scale AI (worker classification class action)TechCrunch10 Dec 2024LawsuitSettled: a $12.5 million class and PAGA settlement was preliminarily approved; the final approval hearing was set for 30 Oct 2026; the settlement site still said on 31 Oct 2026 that the court had not decided (see settlement record) (as of 31 Oct 2026)
Kenya Business Laws (Amendment) Bill 2024: outsourcing (BPO) liability provisionsBusiness Day11 Nov 2024RegulationPassed by the National Assembly on 19 Aug 2026; awaiting presidential assent (see 2026 record) (as of 25 Sep 2026)
EU Platform Work Directive (EU) 2024/2831: transposition by 2 Dec 2026EUR-Lex (Official Journal of the European Union)11 Nov 2024RegulationTransposition deadline 2 Dec 2026 (as of 10 Oct 2026)
Kenya Court of Appeal: Meta can be sued over Sama moderators' claimsBusiness Day20 Sep 2024RulingCases proceed; merits pending (as of 25 Sep 2026)
EU AI Act Article 10: data governance including annotation and labellingEUR-Lex (Official Journal of the European Union)12 Jul 2024RegulationIn force; Article 10 (Chapter III Section 2) applies from 2 Dec 2027 (Annex III systems) and 2 Aug 2028 (Annex I systems) after the Digital Omnibus on AI (as of 24 Jul 2026)
Remotasks discontinued in Kenya, Nigeria and PakistanRest of World7 Mar 2024LayoffCarried out (reported) (as of 28 Mar 2024)
Google terminates Appen contract (rater and AI data projects)Appen Limited (ASX announcement; PDF copy hosted by PPC Land)22 Jan 2024LayoffContract ended by 19 Mar 2024 (as announced) (as of 22 Jan 2024)
Kenyan AI workers petition National Assembly over OpenAI and Sama workTechCrunch14 Jul 2023Labour actionFiled; outcome not found (as of 14 Jul 2023)
Kenyan labour court rules Meta can face trial over moderators' dismissalsThe Eastleigh Voice (AFP)Apr 2023RulingUpheld on appeal (Sept 2024) (as of 21 Sep 2024)
Former Sama moderators sue Meta, Sama and Majorel over dismissalsBusiness DayMar 2023LawsuitPending (merits undecided as of the latest source) (as of 25 Sep 2026)
Kenyan court rules Meta can be sued over moderators' working conditionsThe Eastleigh Voice (AFP)Feb 2023RulingUpheld on appeal (Sept 2024); merits pending as of that report (as of 21 Sep 2024)
Sama exits Meta content moderation, 200 jobs cutTechCrunch10 Jan 2023LayoffAnnounced (as of 10 Jan 2023)

Sample. 35 events from 1 Jan 2023 to 31 Oct 2026, each from the court record, agency, legislation or outlet linked beside it.

An allegation in a complaint is a claim, not a finding: the status says what a court or agency has decided, as of the date given.

Compiled by. AITraining.jobs Research, Lawsuits, Regulation and Labour Actions in AI Training Work, October 2026 edition.

Figure 2

Events by year and kind

Is legal and regulatory activity around AI data work growing?

YearLawsuitRegulationSettlementLayoffInvestigationLabour actionRulingAll
202310010125
202413020017
2025420322013
2026Small sample631000010

Sample. The same 35 events, by the year they happened.

The current year runs to the review date.

Compiled by. AITraining.jobs Research, Lawsuits, Regulation and Labour Actions in AI Training Work, October 2026 edition.

Figure 3

Events by company

Which companies are named in the most events?

CompanyEventsKinds
Scale AI
10
lawsuit, settlement, layoff and investigation
Meta
8
regulation, labour action, ruling, lawsuit and layoff
Sama
8
regulation, ruling, labour action, lawsuit and layoff
Outlier
5
lawsuit
Google
4
layoff and labour action
Handshake
3
lawsuit
Mercor
3
lawsuit
GlobalLogic
2
layoff and labour action
HireArt
2
settlement and investigation
Majorelruling and lawsuit
Remotasks
2
lawsuit and layoff
Accenturelabour action
Appenlayoff
OpenAIlabour action
Surge AIlawsuit
TELUS Digitallabour action
TikToklabour action
Upworkinvestigation
xAIlayoff

Sample. Events naming a company, from 1 Jan 2023 to 31 Oct 2026. An event naming two companies counts for both.

Compiled by. AITraining.jobs Research, Lawsuits, Regulation and Labour Actions in AI Training Work, October 2026 edition.

For labs, data vendors and researchers

The figures above are a summary. Behind them are records we collect ourselves, every day:

  • 11,482 roles tracked, each with its history

    Every role on 62 job boards, read since 13 Jul 2026 (every hour since 18 Oct 2026): its pay and place, and the first and last day it was open.

  • 58,632 apply clicks in 28 days

    Which roles people actually apply to, by field, pay and kind of work. It happens on this site, so nobody else can count it.

  • 39 lab and vendor hiring boards

    The job boards of 25 AI labs and 14 human-data vendors, read every day: who is hiring for human data, and who is hiring to buy it.

What you can buy

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    The rows behind any figure, with their history, not only the totals.

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Building AI and need the experts behind this data? (you contract them yourself) or (we deliver the expert work).

Investing in AI-data companies? Hiring radar is these records role by role, every day, as files.

Method and definitions

Court records, agency announcements, official journals and reporting by major outlets, each linked beside its event. Every row links the publication it is taken from, with the figure as that publication states it; nothing is estimated or converted. Each figure states what it includes beneath it.

Lawsuit
A complaint filed in court. What it alleges is a claim, not a finding; later steps in the same case (a motion, a dismissal, a settlement) are listed as their own events.
Ruling and settlement
A court's decision, or a settlement as approved or announced.
Investigation
An inquiry by a labour or other agency, as announced or reported.
Regulation
A law, directive or official guidance that governs training data or platform work, dated when it was adopted or takes effect.
Labour action and layoff
A petition, union filing or campaign by data workers, and documented mass cuts of raters, tutors or annotators.
Status
Where the event stands according to the latest source found, with that source's date.

What this data cannot tell you

  • Compiled from public sources: an event that was never announced or reported is missing, and private companies' figures are what they or the press stated, not audited.
  • Cases settled privately or sent to arbitration may never publish an outcome, so a status can stay open.
  • Content-moderation cases are included where the same companies and workers do AI data work; the tracker does not cover every labour case in the outsourcing industry.

How the job feeds are read and roles are classified: site methodology. How fresh, complete and consistent the data is, checked every day: data quality and coverage.

Editions

The live report is the dataset as last reviewed; new events are added as they are published. Each complete month is also published as an edition, frozen two days after the month ends, so a figure you cite from an edition never moves.

  • Live dataAs last reviewed
  • October 2026 edition (this page)Freezes on first reading

Cite and reuse

Free to quote, chart and republish under CC BY 4.0 with a link to this page. This edition is frozen, so its figures will read the same later.

Citation

AITraining.jobs (2026). Lawsuits, Regulation and Labour Actions in AI Training Work, October 2026 edition. https://aitraining.jobs/research/ai-training-work-legal-tracker/2026-10

BibTeX

@misc{aitrainingjobs_ai_training_work_legal_tracker_2026_10,
  author = {{AITraining.jobs}},
  title = {Lawsuits, Regulation and Labour Actions in AI Training Work, October 2026 edition},
  year = {2026},
  howpublished = {\url{https://aitraining.jobs/research/ai-training-work-legal-tracker/2026-10}},
}
Data: every figure as CSV (one line per value) and JSON, sent to your work email.Pay and open-roles data

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