To: Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood
Stop the Home Office using experimental AI on asylum seeking children
The Home Office has announced plans to use AI technology at the border to decide whether children seeking asylum are really under 18.
This technology is flawed, discriminatory, and dangerous. The Home Office must reconsider their plans to use it.
This technology is flawed, discriminatory, and dangerous. The Home Office must reconsider their plans to use it.
Why is this important?
Even the Home Office admits facial age estimation can be less accurate for people of colour and has an error margin of around 2.5 years for teenagers — the very age group it wants to assess. Yet a wrong decision could mean a child is treated as an adult, denied protections, placed in inappropriate accommodation, or even face removal from the UK.
Many children seeking asylum have survived war, violence, trafficking and dangerous journeys. Trauma, malnutrition and hardship can affect how young people look. An AI system cannot understand that. This decision must sit with trained social workers, not AI.
The Home Office has failed to publish all the evidence behind its claims that the technology is accurate. It has not released the full equality and data protection assessments. It has not explained what data was used to train the system, or how children will challenge incorrect decisions made about them using the AI.
Children seeking safety deserve care and protection — not to have their future decided by a black-box AI system.
Join us in calling on the Home Secretary to immediately halt the plans for the use of Facial Age Estimation technology on asylum-seeking children until its legality, accuracy, fairness and impact on children's rights can be independently proven and fully scrutinised.
Many children seeking asylum have survived war, violence, trafficking and dangerous journeys. Trauma, malnutrition and hardship can affect how young people look. An AI system cannot understand that. This decision must sit with trained social workers, not AI.
The Home Office has failed to publish all the evidence behind its claims that the technology is accurate. It has not released the full equality and data protection assessments. It has not explained what data was used to train the system, or how children will challenge incorrect decisions made about them using the AI.
Children seeking safety deserve care and protection — not to have their future decided by a black-box AI system.
Join us in calling on the Home Secretary to immediately halt the plans for the use of Facial Age Estimation technology on asylum-seeking children until its legality, accuracy, fairness and impact on children's rights can be independently proven and fully scrutinised.
