Meuwese and Çapkurt awarded funding for algorithmic profiling research
The social coalition 'Over Informatie Gesproken' (meaning ‘Speaking of Information’) recently approved eleven grant applications for research aimed at improving the information relationship between the government and the citizen. Meuwese and Çapkurt’s grant application for research into algorithmic profiling was one of those approved.
Over the past few years, multiple evidence has shown that citizens have mainly been profiled for repressive purposes. Take, for example, the Dutch childcare benefits scandal and the case around the check on grants for students living away from home conducted by the Education Executive Agency (DUO). The precise implications of this profiling for individual citizens is still being investigated.
What is already clear, however, is that from the citizen’s perspective, profiling has resulted in a transparency paradox. Profiling made citizens more transparent towards the government, while conversely, the government did not inform citizens about why and how their personal details were processed for profiling purposes.
Meuwese and Çapkurt's research will focus on profiling within social security. They will examine, from both an empirical and a legal perspective, two different informational practices associated with algorithmic profiling. The aim of the research is to enhance awareness of recent developments in this area with the government, the legal profession and the general public.
More information about Over Informatie Gesproken and the eleven approved applications is available here (in Dutch).
Photo: Markus Spiske through Unsplash