automating inequality by virginia eubanks

I will design no data-based system that overturns an established legal right of the poor. When informed consent and design convenience come into conflict, informed consent will always prevail. I will not collect data for data’s sake, nor keep it just because I can. I will choose system integration as a mechanism to attain human needs, not to facilitate ubiquitous surveillance. I will integrate systems for the needs of people, not data. To ignore a four-century-long pattern of punishing the poor is to be complicit in the “unintended” but terribly predictable consequences that arise when equity and good intentions are assumed as initial conditions. I will not use my technical knowledge to compound the disadvantage created by historic patterns of racism, classism, able-ism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia, transphobia, religious intolerance, and other forms of oppression. I will create tools that remove obstacles between resources and the people who need them.

I will use my skills and resources to create bridges for human potential, not barriers. “Oath of Non-Harm for an Age of Big Data I swear to fulfill, to the best of my ability, the following covenant: I will respect all people for their integrity and wisdom, understanding that they are experts in their own lives, and will gladly share with them all the benefits of my knowledge.

Automating inequality by virginia eubanks