A new report – Government Global Trends 2019 – released by the Observatory of Public Sector Innovation (OPSI), highlights a number of countries where data scores are being used to classify citizens and make decisions based on these groupings. Governments around the world are experimenting with data-driven algorithms to develop policy, but the technique raises new ethical risks and challenges. The use of these technologies, in particular algorithms, has raised questions over how decisions are being made. At last year’s Global Government Summit, concerns were raised over the use in public service delivery of algorithms so complex that public sector staff can’t see how individual decisions are being made, and over who is ultimately responsible for the algorithm. “One could argue that governments should take a ‘wait and see’ approach, and let the private sector ascertain which applications of emerging tech work well and which do not, instead of pursuing risky ventures with public funds.” Read this very interesting article here on Global Government Forum.
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