CORE was established in April 2019, with the appointment of lawyer[1] Sheri Meyerhoffer to the office.

[2] The office investigates suspected corporate ethics[3] and human rights violations.

At the time CORE was looking into fifteen matters, all of which were in the "initial assessment" phase of investigation.

[6] In July 2023, CORE launched its first investigation into Nike Canada and Dynasty Gold Corp., accusing both of exploiting Uyghur forced labour in Xinjiang.

[2] In August the same year, CORE started investigating Ralph Lauren for using a supply chain that included the use of Uyghur forced labour and stated that it was looking into accusations that mining company GobiMin did the same.