#automatingsociety - AlgorithmWatch

Publication, 9 March 2021

Automating Society 2020 – Country issues Germany, France, Italy, Switzerland & Spain

Find all country issues of the Automating Society 2020 report and videos of the launch events on this page.

Blog, 3 February 2021

Presentation of the French and Spanish country issues of the Automating Society Report

We look forward to the publication of the French and Spanish country issues of the Automating Society Report 2020 by AlgorithmWatch and Bertelsmann Stiftung. Both issues will be launched within an online event in the respective national language.

Blog, 25 January 2021

Now available: The German edition of the Automating Society Report 2020

Read the German country edition of the Automating Society Report 2020

Event, 19 January 2021

Register now: Launch event of the German edition of the Automating Society Report on 25 January 2021

How are AI-based systems being used by private companies and public authorities in Europe? The Automating Society Report by AlgorithmWatch and Bertelsmann Stiftung sheds light on what role automated decision-making (ADM) systems play in our lives. On January 25, we will present the German country edition of the report and discuss the results with experts at an online event. The main question will be how the public administration intends to deal with ADM procedures and whether concrete legal rules are needed.

Blog, 13 November 2020

Italian country issue of the Automating Society Report 2020 released

The Automating Society Report 2020 by AlgorithmWatch and Bertelsmann Stiftung is now available as a special Italian edition.

Event, 19 October 2020

Coming soon: Automating Society Report 2020 – Join our launch event on 28 October!

On 28 October AlgorithmWatch and Bertelsmann Stiftung will publish the Automating Society Report 2020 – register now and join our online launch event!

elimirana |Unsplash

Story, 16 September 2020

In Italy, an appetite for face recognition in football stadiums

Right before the pandemic, the government and top sports authorities were planning a massive deployment of face recognition and sound surveillance technologies in all Italian football stadiums. The reason? To help fight racism

Blog, 1 September 2020

Europe wants to be a role model for technological responses to COVID-19. But it’s complicated.

Launch of our new report on 'Automated Decision-Making Systems in the COVID-19 Pandemic'

Publication, 1 September 2020

ADM Systems in the COVID-19 Pandemic: A European Perspective

'Automated Decision-Making Systems in the COVID-19 Pandemic: A European Perspective', by AlgorithmWatch and Bertelsmann Stiftung – a special issue of the Automating Society Report 2020, we published in October 2020.

Kamil Gliwiński |Unsplash

Story, 18 August 2020

Pre-crime at the tax office: How Poland automated the fight against VAT fraud.

In their fight against fraud, Polish tax authorities use STIR, an algorithm sifting through the data of millions of entrepreneurs. The government claims success, but dozens of companies have been hit, some say wrongly.

Darth Liu |Unsplash

Story, 6 August 2020

In a quest to optimize welfare management, Denmark built a surveillance behemoth

Udbetaling Danmark was created in 2012 to streamline the payment of welfare benefits. Its fraud control algorithms can access the personal data of millions of citizens, not all of whom receive welfare payments.

Artiom Vallat |Unsplash

Story, 31 July 2020

Broken Horizon: In Greece, research in automation fails to find applications

Greek researchers led hundreds of research projects that involved automation, but very few found their way into real-life uses. Opinions differ on where the innovation pipeline is clogged.

Boehlich |Wikimedia

Story, 22 July 2020

Swiss police automated crime predictions but has little to show for it

A review of 3 automated systems in use by the Swiss police and judiciary reveals serious issues. Real-world effects are impossible to assess due to a lack of transparency.

Ronnie Macdonald|flickr

Story, 7 July 2020

Slovenian police acquires automated tools first, legalizes them later

The Slovenian police legalized its use of face recognition 5 years after it started to use it. Despite formal safeguards, no institution can restrain the Interior ministry.

Halacious |Unsplash

Story, 29 June 2020

Portugal: Automated verification of prescriptions helped crack down on medical fraud

Portugal’s national health service introduced a centralized, automated system to verify medical prescriptions in 2016. One year later, it flagged 20 million euros’ worth of fraud.

Marcus Kauffman|Unsplash

Story, 17 June 2020

Can AI mitigate the climate crisis? Not really.

Several institutions claim that AI will contribute to solving the climate crisis, but evidence is scant. On the contrary, AI has a track record of helping emit more greenhouse gases.

Acount222 |Wikimedia

Story, 26 May 2020

Estonia: A city is automating homes to reduce energy consumption

The city of Tartu installed automated systems in old housing blocks. Using nudges, sensors and automated decision-making, it hopes to reduce energy consumption by two-thirds.

Alexandr Bormotin |Unsplash

Story, 15 May 2020

Finland: How to unionize when your boss is an algorithm and you’re self-employed

A group of Finnish couriers launched the Justice4Couriers campaign in 2018. Although they are technically self-employed, they must obey the whims of their platform’s algorithm. They are fighting back.

Melanie Wasser|Unsplash

Story, 27 April 2020

In Spain, the VioGén algorithm attempts to forecast gender violence

As part of a program to curb feminicides, Spain built VioGén, an algorithm that assesses the risk faced by victims of gender violence. It remains a work in progress.

Benjamin Davies |Unsplash

Story, 8 April 2020

Brexit: How EU nationals navigate the automated checks of the “Settled Status” program

The British Home Office deployed a mobile app for EU citizens to obtain permission to stay in the UK. Some are confident about the partly automated process, others live Kafkaesque experiences.

Zicht op kruising Europaweg en Boerhaavelaan in Haarlem.

Jeroen van Lieshout |flickr

Story, 6 April 2020

How Dutch activists got an invasive fraud detection algorithm banned

The Dutch government has been using SyRI, a secret algorithm, to detect possible social welfare fraud. Civil rights activists have taken the matter to court and managed to get public organizations to think about less repressive alternatives.

Sint-Katelijne-Waver |flickr

Story, 3 April 2020

In Flanders, an algorithm attempts to make school choice fairer

In Belgium, some schools don’t have enough capacity for all students that want to go there. In the Flemish part of the country, the government introduced an algorithm to assign places in schools, in the hope of giving every student the same chances.

Charlotta Wasteson |flickr

Story, 17 March 2020

Central authorities slow to react as Sweden’s cities embrace automation of welfare management

Trelleborg is Sweden’s front-runner in automating welfare distribution. An analysis of the system's source code brought little transparency – but revealed that the personal data of hundreds was wrongly made public.

Médiathèque Pierre Fanlac de Périgueux

Story, 11 February 2020

Between care and control: 200 years of health data in France

The French “Health Data Hub” will soon offer health data on all French citizens to AI startups that request it. It is the latest step in a project to centralize health information that began 200 years ago and kept oscillating between care and control, but mostly control.

Stefanie Loos/re:publica

Video, 10 May 2019

#rp19 talk: Citizen Scoring in the EU – it happens at home, not only in China!

On 7 May Kristina Penner and Matthias Spielkamp presented the key findings of our report Automating Society – Taking Stock of Automated Decision-Making in the EU at re:publica 2019 in Berlin. The video of the session is now available on YouTube.

Video & press review, 6 February 2019

Report ‘Automating Society’: video of the launch event & press review

Overview of the press coverage of the report 'Automating Society - Taking Stock of Automated Decision-Making in the EU' and the video of the launch event

Launch event, 29 January 2019

Launch event for the report “Automating Society” in the European Parliament

Please join us for the launch of the report Automating Society Taking Stock of Automated Decision-Making in the EU A report by AlgorithmWatch in cooperation with Bertelsmann Stiftung, supported by the Open Society Foundations Date: Tuesday, 29 January 2019 Time: 09:00 – 10:30 Room: Paul-Henri Spaak P4B001, EP, Entrance Altiero Spinelli KINDLY HOSTED BY…

Event, 25 January 2019

CPDP breakfast meeting: Presentation of the report ‘Automating Society’ on 30 January

Join us for the presentation and discussion of Automating Society Taking Stock of Automated Decision-Making in the EU a report by AlgorithmWatch in cooperation with Bertelsmann Stiftung, supported by the Open Society Foundations When Wednesday, 30 January 2019 07h30 – 8h30 Where CPDP conference, Petite Halle Les Halles de Schaerbeek, Rue Royale-Sainte-Marie 22, 1030 Brussels…

Event, 16 January 2019

Launch event for the report “Automating Society” in the European Parliament

Please join us for the launch of the report Automating Society Taking Stock of Automated Decision-Making in the EU A report by AlgorithmWatch in cooperation with Bertelsmann Stiftung, supported by the Open Society Foundations Date: Tuesday, 29 January 2019 Time: 09:00 – 10:30 Room: Paul-Henri Spaak P4B001, EP, Entrance Altiero Spinelli KINDLY HOSTED BY…

Story, 21 November 2018

Finnish Credit Score Ruling raises Questions about Discrimination and how to avoid it

In a case not well known outside Finland, a tribunal threatened to fine Svea Ekonomi AB for 100,000 euros on the grounds that it declined credit to a customer by using statistical models that are in violation of anti-discrimination laws. The case raises some hard questions about the practice of credit scoring and how it could be done.