Despite what you might have been told, facts are not equivalent to truth, and data is never objective.
The implication of that problem for asylum seekers is under investigation by computer scientists at the University of Copenhagen. They found that complex data practices used by authorities to rate the credibility of asylum seekers could undermine those applicants’ rights.
Trine Rask Nielsen, leader of the Copenhagen research team, commented “In the decision summaries we analysed, applicants are deemed untrustworthy and refused asylum if discrepancies are found between different data sources.” But the Refugee Appeals Board’s credibility assessment procedure involves estimating various kinds of data produced in many different places, which can be interpreted differently by different agencies.
Nielsen also noted that social media is regularly used to document the credibility of asylum seekers’ claims. But social media is notoriously subjective.
“The increasing amount of data and use of various data in asylum cases can make decision-making processes opaque for asylum seekers. While more data can be positive, it’s important to keep in mind that data is never objective. We need to be especially critical when using new types of data as a basis for decisions that can have such a major impact on the lives of vulnerable people,” Nielsen added.
Naja Holten Møller, associate professor at the Department of Computer Science who leads the part of the research project on data and practices, concluded, “As a matter of principle, we should consider to what extent the use of data and databases supports our democratic value of transparency in decision-making processes. And we should look at how authorities consider those values in their work, both when developing practices and the data-based tools to support them. This study is an important first piece in establishing an opportunity to study how data is used in the asylum area.”