Security News > 2020 > June > Experts Denounce Racial Bias of Crime-Predictive Facial-Recognition AI
More than 1,000 technology experts and academics from organizations such as MIT, Microsoft, Harvard and Google have signed an open letter denouncing a forthcoming paper describing artificial intelligence algorithms that can predict crime based only on a person's face, calling it out for promoting racial bias and propagating a #TechtoPrisonPipeline.
The paper describes an "Automated computer facial recognition software capable of predicting whether someone is likely going to be a criminal," according to a press release about the research.
While crime-prediction technology based on computational research in and of itself is not specifically racially biased, it "Reproduces, naturalizes and amplifies discriminatory outcomes," and is also "Based on unsound scientific premises, research, and methods, which numerous studies spanning our respective disciplines have debunked over the years," experts wrote in their letter.
The use of facial recognition technology in general has always been controversial, and it's current facing new legal, ethical and commercial challenges, including to its use by law enforcement.
Microsoft recently joined Amazon and IBM in banning the sale of facial recognition technology to police departments and pushing for federal laws to regulate the technology.