This paper argues that human rights impact assessments (HRIAs) in the technological sector are inherently handicapped by the voluntary approach to business and human rights in which they are conceptually and genealogically embedded. It argues that they are—by themselves—incapable of addressing the problems of vagueness, disagreement, and paradoxes that affect human rights law and the limited knowledge we have regarding the effects technology has on society. The former is a legal problem; the latter is epistemological. While neither of these obstacles, properly understood, are insurmountable, meeting them presents a few challenges. This paper explains why and offers possible strategies and a path forward, based on a critique of the voluntary framework and its implied denial of human rights as legal concepts and institutions.