In 2019, guards on the border of Greece, Hungary and Latvia has begun testing an artificial intelligence-powered lie detector. The system, called iBorderCtrl, analyzed facial movements to look for signs that a person was lying to a border guard. The trial was spurred by nearly $5 million in European Union research funding, and almost 20 years research at Manchester Metropolitan University, in the United Kingdom.
The trial sparked controversy. Multigraphs and other technologies built to detect lies from physical attributes have been widely declared by psychologists to be unreliable. Soon, errors were also reported from iBorderCtrl. Media reports indicate that lie prediction algorithm not workingand the project’s own website admit that technology “may pose risks to basic human rights.”
This month, Silent Talker, a spin-off from Manchester Met, which made the underlying technology iBorderCtrl, is dissolved. But that’s not the end of the story. Lawyers, activists and lawmakers are pushing for a European Union law to regulate AI that would ban systems that claim to detect human deception during migration — cite iBorderCtrl as an example of what can go wrong. Former Silent Talker executives could not be reached for comment.
The ban on AI lie detectors at the border is one of thousands of amendments to AI Act is being considered by officials from EU countries and members of the European Parliament. Legislation aimed at protecting EU citizens’ basic rights, such as the right to live without discrimination or to claim asylum. It labeled some AI use cases as “high-risk”, some “low-risk”, and put a complete ban on others. Lobbyists to change the AI Act include human rights groups, trade unions and companies like Google and Microsoftwants the AI Act to distinguish between those who create general-purpose AI systems and those who implement them for specific uses.
Last month, advocacy groups included Digital Rights Europe and the International Cooperation Platform on Undocumented Migrants Is called for the prohibition of using AI multigraphs to measure things like eye movements, voice, or facial expressions at contours. Statewatch, a civil liberties nonprofit, has released a analysis warned that the AI Act as written would allow the use of systems like iBorderCtrl, adding to Europe’s existing “publicly funded frontier AI ecosystem”. The analysis calculates that over the past two decades, about half of the 341 million euros ($356 million) in funding for the use of AI at the border, such as profiling migrants, has gone to public companies. private company.
The use of AI lie detectors at the border effectively creates new immigration policy through technology, said Petra Molnar, deputy director of the nonprofit. “You have to prove that you are a refugee and you are considered a liar unless proven otherwise,” she said. “That logic underlies everything. It underpins AI’s lie detection tools, and further strengthens surveillance and pushback at the border. “
Molnar, an immigration attorney, says that people often avoid making eye contact with border or migration officials for innocuous reasons – such as culture, religion or trauma – but doing so sometimes misunderstood as a signal that a person is hiding something. Humans often struggle with cross-cultural communication or talking to people who have been through trauma, she said, so why would anyone believe a machine can do better?
