Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, STATE-LAW CLAIMS—D. Mass.: Amazon applicant advances claims under state’s lie detector statute, (Feb 20, 2026)

By Kathleen Kapusta, J.D.

“The Commonwealth of Massachusetts generally prohibits the use of lie detector tests as part of an application for employment.”

Denying Amazon’s motion to dismiss an applicant’s putative class claims the e-commerce giant failed to comply with the notice provisions of the state’s lie detector statute and unlawfully administered a lie detector test, a federal court in Massachusetts found he plausibly pleaded that the company’s Workstyle Assessment is a lie detector test and that he is a “person aggrieved” under the statute. The court also found he has a private right of action to enforce the statute’s notice provision in concert with the test administration claim (Korn v. Amazon.com, Inc., No. 25-10802-WGY (D. Mass. Feb. 18, 2026)).

When he applied for three positions with Amazon in 2024, the plaintiff alleged that he was not provided with a notice of his rights under Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 149, § 19B concerning lie detector tests. Specifically, Section 19B (2) provides that “(b) All applications for employment within the commonwealth shall contain the following notice which shall be in clearly legible print: ‘It is unlawful in Massachusetts to require or administer a lie detector test as a condition of employment or continued employment. An employer who violates this law shall be subject to criminal penalties and civil liability.’”

Workstyle Assessment. According to the plaintiff, he was required as part of the application process to take a “Workstyle Assessment,” which he claimed was a lie detector test. Amazon, however, explains to its applicants that the assessment is derived from its leadership principles and is intended to assist the company in hiring “people who are engaged, positive, and have a sense of ownership over their work and events that happen to them.” Amazon also explains that to ensure the fairness of the assessment, it “uses mechanisms to detect suspicious test behavior and responses.”

The assessment, among other things, contains a list of statements such as “Most projects need a structured plan. / I like planning, but often address problems as they come.” “I often choose predictability over the unknown. / I adapt to change quickly.” “I'm about as reliable as everyone else on my team. /I persist until a task is done.” Job applicants are asked to choose the extent to which a statement represents their work style and, according to the plaintiff, Amazon states that it uses the assessments to get to know the “authentic” applicant.

Lawsuit. The plaintiff sought to bring a class action for those who applied for a Massachusetts-based position, and a subclass for those who completed the assessment. He is seeking declaratory, compensatory, and injunctive relief and counts for unlawfully administering a lie detector test and the failure to advise him of his rights under the statute.

Lie detector test. Under the statute, “...the term ‘lie detector test’ shall mean any test utilizing a polygraph or any other device, mechanism, instrument or written examination, which is operated, or the results of which are used or interpreted by an examiner for the purpose of purporting to assist in or enable the detection of deception, the verification of truthfulness, or the rendering of a diagnostic opinion regarding the honesty of an individual.” For its part, Amazon argued its assessment is a personality test similar to the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI), which was at issue in Auguste v. G4S Secure Solutions (USA), Inc., a 2016 decision by the Massachusetts Superior Court.

In that decision, a prospective security guard was cleared for the position and began working after taking the MMPI-2. But that decision, the court here noted, related to a motion for summary judgment and was made on a factual record after discovery. Here, taking all inferences in favor of the plaintiff, the court found he plausibly pled the assessment is a lie detector test, not an MMPI-like tool.

Person aggrieved. Amazon next argued that the plaintiff was not a “person aggrieved” under Section 19B (4) of the statute as he did not suffer a “substantial injury,” and thus he lacked statutory standing. Because there was no First Circuit or Massachusetts authority on the meaning of “substantial injury” under the statute here, the court turned to decisions from the Massachusetts Superior Court, and specifically the Business Litigation Session of that court, which had recently consolidated a number of notice provision cases under Massachusetts law and ruled that a plaintiff is not a “person aggrieved” solely on a notice violation because there is no injury.

Ababio. In particular, the court here pointed to Ababio v Nike Retail Servs., Inc., which compared the statutory language of Section 19B to other statutes and concluded that the plaintiffs in that case were not “persons aggrieved” because the alleged notice harm without more is at best “minimal or slightly appreciable,” and “speculative.” The Ababio court determined that under Massachusetts law, there are five “criteria to qualify as a person aggrieved: (1) a plaintiff must suffer some infringement of their legal rights; (2) the asserted right or interest must be one the statute is designed to protect; (3) the alleged harm must be caused by the statutory violation; (4) it must be more than minimal or slightly appreciable; (5) and it must not be speculative.

According to the Ababio court, while the first three criteria had been shown, the “plaintiffs [could not] show that they suffered a harm from defendants’ violation of the notice provision that is more than minimal or slightly appreciable, or a harm that is more than speculative,” and therefore “they [did] not qualify as ‘persons aggrieved’ by a violation of the Lie Detector Statute.” In a footnote, however, the Ababio court explained that the result would likely be different if the notice violation was, as alleged by the plaintiff here, combined with the use of a lie detector test. In that situation, a plaintiff is aggrieved and has two claims—one for lack of notice and another for being administered a lie detector test.

Adopting this analysis, the court here found the plaintiff is a “person aggrieved” under Section 19B because he sufficiently pleaded a notice violation and a lie detector test administration. Accordingly, the court found he has statutory standing under the law.

Private right of action. In finding next that the plaintiff has a private right of action, the court turned to the statutory language stating that “Any person aggrieved by a violation of subsection (2) may institute... a civil action...” While Amazon argued that section 2—which makes it unlawful for an employer to subject applicants and others to a lie detector test—is different from subparagraphs 2(a) and 2(b), this argument, the court observed, was rejected by Ababio.

Agreeing again with Ababio, the court explained that “under Massachusetts law, there exists a private right of action for a Section 19B notice violation, but likely concomitant with statutory standing if it is brought, as here, in conjunction with a lie detector administration claim that plausibly pleads injury.” Accordingly, the court denied Amazon’s motion to dismiss.

The case is No. 25-10802-WGY.

Judge: Young, W.

Attorneys: David S. Godkin (Birnbaum & Godkin) for Justin Korn. Stephanie Schuster (Morgan, Lewis & Bockius) for Amazon.com, Inc.

Companies: Amazon.com, Inc.

Cases: StateLawClaims Procedure ClassActions MassachusettsNews