Unding.de – disputing automated decisions

25 February 2021

Our daily lives are increasingly affected by automated decisions. And when something goes wrong, we often don’t know where to turn. Imagine so much traffic being routed through your neighborhood by navigation apps, that you can’t safely cross the street. Or the photo booths at public offices don’t recognize your face because they don’t work on your skin color. Or you have been denied a loan because the system calculated a low credit score.

It’s often unclear how automated decisions are made. But when those affected want to call the results into question or even dispute them, the responsible parties like to turn a blind eye. Points of contact are hard to find and people are often left to fend for themselves.

Our new platform Unding (German for an outrageous absurdity) is here to change that: As a messenger service, it forwards your concerns regarding automated decisions to the responsible parties – administrations or companies. Unding helps to channel your discontempt in the right direction. The tool even supports you with further steps down the line – sends follow ups, notifies you on updates and helps finding the right answers to official replies.

You are not alone. Share your experience, so that together, we can send companies, administrations and policy makers a clear message: Take responsibility. Not everything that’s legal is also acceptable. Create points of contact and start listening to people affected by your products and services.

One more thing: Unding.de is still in its testing and development phase. Please give us your feedback (to unding@algorithmwatch.org) and help us improve the platform.