Home Office to drop 'racist' visa approval algorithm

A “racist” algorithm used by the Home Office to make decisions on visa applications has been dropped after campaigners warned that it acted like a “speedy boarding for white people.”

The Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants (JCWI) and digital rights group Foxglove launched a legal challenge against the technology which they said “entrenched racism and bias” into the visa process.

The algorithm, which had been used by the Home Office since 2015, worked by automatically assigning each person with a green, amber or red rating based on the information provided in their visa application.

Foxglove alleged that the Home Office kept a "secret list of suspect nationalities" which would automatically be given a red rating.

Secretary of State for the Home Department Priti Patel has committed to a redesign of the system and said that use of the algorithm will be “suspended” from Friday, August 7.

In a letter to the groups, the Government's solicitor stated that the review did not mean that Ms Patel “accepts the allegations” put forward.

The letter also stated that the Home Office had “already moved away” from the use of the streaming tool.

“Given the relatively low volumes of visa applications since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, and the impact the pandemic has had on international travel, it has been decided that it is timely to take advantage of the low number of overseas applications to redesign the system now,” the letter stated.

The Home Office said the processing of visa applications will take place by reference to “person-centric attributes”, citing evidence of previous travel as an example. The letter also stated that nationality will “not be taken into account”. The redesign is expected to be completed by October 30 at the latest.

Foxglove director and founder Cori Crider said that the Home Office had “seen sense” in scrapping the tool ahead of a judicial review

“Racist feedback loops meant that what should have been a fair migration process was, in practice, just speedy boarding for white people,” she claimed.

“What we need is democracy, not government by algorithm. Before any further systems get rolled out, let’s ask experts and the public whether automation is appropriate at all, and how historic biases can be spotted and dug out at the roots.”

JCWI legal policy director Chai Patel said the immigration system needs to be “rebuilt from the ground up” to monitor for biases.

“This streaming tool took decades of institutionally racist practices, such as targeting particular nationalities for immigration raids, and turned them into software,” he said.

The Home Office said it had been reviewing how the streaming tool operates. A spokesperson said: “We do not accept the allegations Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants made in their judicial review claim and whilst litigation is still on-going it would not be appropriate for the department to comment any further.”