The politics of deceptive borders: 'biomarkers of deceit' and the case of iBorderCtrl

This paper critically examines a recently developed proposal for a border control system called iBorderCtrl, designed to detect deception based on facial recognition technology and the measurement of micro-expressions, termed 'biomarkers of deceit'. Funded under the European Commission's Horizon 2020 programme, we situate our analysis in the wider political economy of 'emotional AI' and the history of deception detection technologies. We then move on to interrogate the design of iBorderCtrl using publicly available documents and assess the assumptions and scientific validation underpinning the project design. Finally, drawing on a Bayesian analysis we outline statistical fallacies in the foundational premise of mass screening and argue that it is very unlikely that the model that iBorderCtrl provides for deception detection would work in practice. By interrogating actual systems in this way, we argue that we can begin to question the very premise of the development of data-driven systems, and emotional AI and deception detection in particular, pushing back on the assumption that these systems are fulfilling the tasks they claim to be attending to and instead ask what function such projects carry out in the creation of subjects and management of populations. This function is not merely technical but, rather, we argue, distinctly political and forms part of a mode of governance increasingly shaping life opportunities and fundamental rights

Justicia de datos

La justicia de datos brinda un marco clave para analizar la intersección entre datificación y sociedad desde una perspectiva que muestre un compromiso por la justicia social. Esta perspectiva no es nueva en el análisis de los sistemas de información y comunicación, pero el concepto de justicia de datos busca denotar un cambio en la comprensión acerca de lo que está en juego en torno a los procesos de datificación, más allá de los derechos digitales. En este ensayo, buscaremos delinear las diferentes tradiciones y perspectivas a través de las cuales se expresa el concepto. Al hacerlo, nos enfrentaremos con tensiones que denotan una política de la justicia de datos, tanto en términos de aquello que está en juego en la datificación como de cuáles podrían ser las respuestas adecuadas

Data Justice

Data justice has emerged as a key framework for engaging with the intersection of datafication and society in a way that privileges an explicit concern with social justice. Engaging with justice concerns in the analysis of information and communication systems is not in itself new, but the concept of data justice has been used to denote a shift in understanding of what is at stake with datafication beyond digital rights. In this essay, we trace the lineage and outline some of the different traditions and approaches through which the concept is currently finding expression. We argue that in doing so, we are confronted with tensions that denote a politics of data justice both in terms of what is at stake with datafication and what might be suitable responses

The datafication of the workplace

Technological changes in the workplace has a long history, but the recent onus on the generation of data as a central part of the digital economy brings about particular transformations that deserve further attention. Communications tools such as phones, email and computers are monitored in many companies, at the same time as new data sources such as social networks, shared calendars or collaborative working tools are being integrated to increase knowledge not only about the professional activities of workers but also about who they are, or what they might be likely to do in the future. In addition, chips, wearables and sensor networks are increasingly integrated within the broader trend of the Internet of Things (IoT)2 to facilitate emotional as well as physical states. The development of machine learning (ML) facilitates the automated processing of information, whilst multimedia databases are being labelled with semantic information to identify and measure activities, and natural language processing (NLP) can extract knowledge from non-structured texts, such as emails and social networking content to perform sentiment and tone analysis. In this report we provide an overview of these trends within the context of Europe, and focus particularly on tools used for hiring, employee surveillance, performance assessment and management. The overview presented here is not intended to be comprehensive, but is intended to identify key trends with concrete examples of prominent companies and tools in this space, as a way to advance further research agendas on the datafication of the workplace

How to (partially) evaluate automated decision systems

Depicting the social impact of automated decision systems requires multiple interdisciplinary entry-points. In this paper we focus on the actual data and algorithms that produce specific outputs for the purposes of decision-making. The aim of this report is to outline the range of prominent methods that are used for auditing algorithms in data-driven systems and to also consider some of their limitations

Coagulación intravascular diseminada: Una revisión de tema

Introduction: Disseminated intravascular coagulation is a secondary syndrome to underlying pathologies, where localized coagulation activation and generalized inflammatory response can lead to tissue and microvascular damage. A prevalence of 10.8% has been reported in several intensive care units in Colombia. Its presentation in the context of sepsis is different depending on the type of infection. Objective: To conduct a review of literature of the most outstanding concepts of disseminated intravascular coagulation. Materials and methods: A review was made by means of the search of original articles, systematic and narrative reviews, in the PubMed and ScienceDirect databases and in the Google Scholar search engine; 80 articles were selected, of which 51 were included. Publications were taken into account in Spanish, English and French, with a publication date of less than or equal to 5 years. Results: The description of treatment, etiology, clinical presentation and diagnosis of Disseminated Intravascular Coagulation was made, with special emphasis on the studies on molecular markers and new therapeutic alternatives. Conclusion: Disseminated intravascular coagulation is a complication which contributes to increase morbidity and mortality, whose early diagnosis and treatment contribute significantly to better clinical evolution

What does it mean to 'solve' the problem of discrimination in hiring? Social, technical and legal perspectives from the UK on automated hiring systems

Discriminatory practices in recruitment and hiring are an ongoing issue that is a concern not just for workplace relations, but also for wider understandings of economic justice and inequality. The ability to get and keep a job is a key aspect of participating in society and sustaining livelihoods. Yet the way decisions are made on who is eligible for jobs, and why, are rapidly changing with the advent and growth in uptake of automated hiring systems (AHSs) powered by data-driven tools. Evidence of the extent of this uptake around the globe is scarce, but a recent report estimated that 98% of Fortune 500 companies use Applicant Tracking Systems of some kind in their hiring process, a trend driven by perceived efficiency measures and cost-savings. Key concerns about such AHSs include the lack of transparency and potential limitation of access to jobs for specific profiles. In relation to the latter, however, several of these AHSs claim to detect and mitigate discriminatory practices against protected groups and promote diversity and inclusion at work. Yet whilst these tools have a growing user-base around the world, such claims of 'bias mitigation' are rarely scrutinised and evaluated, and when done so, have almost exclusively been from a US socio-legal perspective. In this paper, we introduce a perspective outside the US by critically examining how three prominent automated hiring systems (AHSs) in regular use in the UK, HireVue, Pymetrics and Applied, understand and attempt to mitigate bias and discrimination. These systems have been chosen as they explicitly claim to address issues of discrimination in hiring and, unlike many of their competitors, provide some information about how their systems work that can inform an analysis. Using publicly available documents, we describe how their tools are designed, validated and audited for bias, highlighting assumptions and limitations, before situating these in the socio-legal context of the UK. The UK has a very different legal background to the US in terms not only of hiring and equality law, but also in terms of data protection (DP) law. We argue that this might be important for addressing concerns about transparency and could mean a challenge to building bias mitigation into AHSs definitively capable of meeting EU legal standards. This is significant as these AHSs, especially those developed in the US, may obscure rather than improve systemic discrimination in the workplace

Relacion entre el indice de variabilidad lexica y la edad en ninos con desarrollo tipico del lenguaje

54 p.El propósito del presente trabajo fue conocer la relación existente entre el Índice de Variabilidad Léxica (IVL) y la edad de niños de la ciudad de Talca con desarrollo típico del lenguaje, específicamente en niños de 6 años a 6 años 11 meses de edad. La hipótesis planteada es “el Índice de Variabilidad Léxica (IVL) en niños con desarrollo típico del lenguaje de 6 años a 8 años 11 meses de edad pertenecientes a la ciudad de Talca en la Región del Maule, se correlaciona directa y positivamente con la edad”. Así, se seleccionó una muestra aleatoria y representativa de niños pertenecientes a establecimientos educacionales particular subvencionados de la ciudad de Talca, en la Región del Maule. Los resultados indican que no existe una relación estrecha entre el índice de variabilidad léxica y la edad de estos niños, es decir, a medida que aumenta la edad no aumenta la habilidad para producir palabras nuevas, e incrementar así la totalidad de palabras que conforman sus enunciados. Finalmente se discuten las proyecciones clínicas de la presente investigación

Fit for purpose? The Facilitation Directive and the criminalisation of humanitarian assistance to irregular migrants: 2018 Update. Study Requested by the PETI committee. CEPS Special Report, Decenber 2018

This study, commissioned by the European Parliament’s Policy Department for Citizens’ Rights and Constitutional Affairs at the request of the PETI Committee, aims to update the 2016 study “Fit for purpose? The Facilitation Directive and the criminalisation of humanitarian assistance to irregular migrants”. It takes stock of and examines the latest developments that have taken place since 2016, specifically the legislative and policy changes, along with various forms and cases of criminalisation of humanitarian actors, migrants’ family members and basic service providers. The study uses the notion of ‘policing humanitarianism’ to describe not only cases of formal prosecution and sentencing in criminal justice procedures, but also wider dynamics of suspicion, intimidation, harassment and disciplining in five selected Member States – Belgium, France, Greece, Hungary and Italy. Policing humanitarianism negatively affects EU citizens’ rights – such as the freedom of assembly, freedom of speech and freedom of conscience. When civil society is effectively (self-)silenced and its accountability role undermined, policies to combat migrant smuggling may be overused and give rise to serious breaches of the EU’s founding values, notably the rule of law, democracy and fundamental rights. Moreover, policing humanitarianism negatively affects wider societal trust and diverts the limited resources of law enforcement from investigating more serious crimes