Teaching computing, race, and policing -- a lesson about surveillance, AI, and facial recognition
Dear AoIR colleagues, Yesterday the Wayne County Prosecutor publicly apologized to the first American known to be wrongfully arrested by a facial recognition algorithm: a black man arrested earlier this year by the Detroit Police. The statement cited the unreliability of software, especially as applied to people of color. With this context in mind, some university and high school instructors teaching about technology may be interested in engaging with the Black Lives Matter protests by teaching about computing, race, and surveillance. I'm delighted that thanks to the generosity of Tawana Petty and others, ESC can share a module on this topic developed for an online course. You are free to make use of it in your own teaching, or you might just find the materials interesting (or shocking). The lesson consists of a case study of Detroit’s Project Green Light, a new city-wide police surveillance system that involves automated facial recognition, real-time police monitoring, very-high-resolution imagery, cameras indoors on private property, a paid “priority” response system, a public/private partnership, and other distinctive features. The system has allegedly been deployed to target peaceful Black Lives Matter protesters. Here is the lesson: Race, Policing, and Detroit's Project Green Light http://esc.umich.edu/project-green-light/ The lesson includes videos, readings (including yesterday's apology), and suggested discussion questions and assessment. With some tuning, this lesson is suitable for courses in Information Science, Computer Science, Science & Technology Studies (STS), Information Technology, Sociology, Criminology, Media Studies, Public Policy, Law, Urban Planning, Ethnic Studies, and Applied Ethics. If you know of a mailing list that would reach instructors of these courses who would be interested, please feel free to forward this email. This lesson is offered as part of the "Emergency ESC" initiative from the Center for Ethics, Society, and Computing. If you are an instructor and you are willing to share similar material, ESC would be happy to act as a clearinghouse for these lessons and to promote them, whether or not you are affiliated with our center. Please e-mail esc-center@umich.edu to suggest or contribute. We will share selections on the "Emergency ESC" page in the future (http://esc.umich.edu/emergency/). Sincerely, Christian -- Christian Sandvig Director, Center for Ethics, Society, and Computing (ESC) H. Marshall McLuhan Collegiate Professor, School of Information; Dept. of Communication & Media; Center for Political Studies University of Michigan http://umich.edu/~csandvig - http://esc.umich.edu/
Thank you! Incredibly useful and timely. Sarah Sarah Oates Professor and Senior Scholar Philip Merrill College of Journalism University of Maryland College Park, MD 20457 Email: soates@umd.edu Phone: 301 455 2332 www.media-politics.com Twitter: @media_politics *Support the UMD Student Crisis Fund <https://giving.umd.edu/giving/showPage.php?name=crisis-funding> today. * On Thu, Jun 25, 2020 at 3:31 PM Christian Sandvig <csandvig@umich.edu> wrote:
Dear AoIR colleagues,
Yesterday the Wayne County Prosecutor publicly apologized to the first American known to be wrongfully arrested by a facial recognition algorithm: a black man arrested earlier this year by the Detroit Police. The statement cited the unreliability of software, especially as applied to people of color.
With this context in mind, some university and high school instructors teaching about technology may be interested in engaging with the Black Lives Matter protests by teaching about computing, race, and surveillance. I'm delighted that thanks to the generosity of Tawana Petty and others, ESC can share a module on this topic developed for an online course. You are free to make use of it in your own teaching, or you might just find the materials interesting (or shocking).
The lesson consists of a case study of Detroit’s Project Green Light, a new city-wide police surveillance system that involves automated facial recognition, real-time police monitoring, very-high-resolution imagery, cameras indoors on private property, a paid “priority” response system, a public/private partnership, and other distinctive features. The system has allegedly been deployed to target peaceful Black Lives Matter protesters. Here is the lesson:
Race, Policing, and Detroit's Project Green Light http://esc.umich.edu/project-green-light/
The lesson includes videos, readings (including yesterday's apology), and suggested discussion questions and assessment. With some tuning, this lesson is suitable for courses in Information Science, Computer Science, Science & Technology Studies (STS), Information Technology, Sociology, Criminology, Media Studies, Public Policy, Law, Urban Planning, Ethnic Studies, and Applied Ethics. If you know of a mailing list that would reach instructors of these courses who would be interested, please feel free to forward this email.
This lesson is offered as part of the "Emergency ESC" initiative from the Center for Ethics, Society, and Computing. If you are an instructor and you are willing to share similar material, ESC would be happy to act as a clearinghouse for these lessons and to promote them, whether or not you are affiliated with our center. Please e-mail esc-center@umich.edu to suggest or contribute. We will share selections on the "Emergency ESC" page in the future (http://esc.umich.edu/emergency/).
Sincerely, Christian
-- Christian Sandvig Director, Center for Ethics, Society, and Computing (ESC) H. Marshall McLuhan Collegiate Professor, School of Information; Dept. of Communication & Media; Center for Political Studies University of Michigan http://umich.edu/~csandvig - http://esc.umich.edu/ _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
Hats off to Christian, ESC, and the entire team! I'm putting together a new upper-level undergraduate course, and will certainly integrate this module. It's immensely helpful! Thanks a bunch! All best, jack qiu On Fri, 26 Jun 2020 at 03:55, Sarah Ann Oates <soates@umd.edu> wrote:
Thank you! Incredibly useful and timely. Sarah
Sarah Oates
Professor and Senior Scholar Philip Merrill College of Journalism University of Maryland College Park, MD 20457 Email: soates@umd.edu Phone: 301 455 2332 www.media-politics.com Twitter: @media_politics
*Support the UMD Student Crisis Fund <https://giving.umd.edu/giving/showPage.php?name=crisis-funding> today. *
On Thu, Jun 25, 2020 at 3:31 PM Christian Sandvig <csandvig@umich.edu> wrote:
Dear AoIR colleagues,
Yesterday the Wayne County Prosecutor publicly apologized to the first American known to be wrongfully arrested by a facial recognition algorithm: a black man arrested earlier this year by the Detroit Police. The statement cited the unreliability of software, especially as applied to people of color.
With this context in mind, some university and high school instructors teaching about technology may be interested in engaging with the Black Lives Matter protests by teaching about computing, race, and surveillance. I'm delighted that thanks to the generosity of Tawana Petty and others, ESC can share a module on this topic developed for an online course. You are free to make use of it in your own teaching, or you might just find the materials interesting (or shocking).
The lesson consists of a case study of Detroit’s Project Green Light, a new city-wide police surveillance system that involves automated facial recognition, real-time police monitoring, very-high-resolution imagery, cameras indoors on private property, a paid “priority” response system, a public/private partnership, and other distinctive features. The system has allegedly been deployed to target peaceful Black Lives Matter protesters. Here is the lesson:
Race, Policing, and Detroit's Project Green Light http://esc.umich.edu/project-green-light/
The lesson includes videos, readings (including yesterday's apology), and suggested discussion questions and assessment. With some tuning, this lesson is suitable for courses in Information Science, Computer Science, Science & Technology Studies (STS), Information Technology, Sociology, Criminology, Media Studies, Public Policy, Law, Urban Planning, Ethnic Studies, and Applied Ethics. If you know of a mailing list that would reach instructors of these courses who would be interested, please feel free to forward this email.
This lesson is offered as part of the "Emergency ESC" initiative from the Center for Ethics, Society, and Computing. If you are an instructor and you are willing to share similar material, ESC would be happy to act as a clearinghouse for these lessons and to promote them, whether or not you are affiliated with our center. Please e-mail esc-center@umich.edu to suggest or contribute. We will share selections on the "Emergency ESC" page in the future (http://esc.umich.edu/emergency/).
Sincerely, Christian
-- Christian Sandvig Director, Center for Ethics, Society, and Computing (ESC) H. Marshall McLuhan Collegiate Professor, School of Information; Dept. of Communication & Media; Center for Political Studies University of Michigan http://umich.edu/~csandvig - http://esc.umich.edu/ _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
-- Jack Linchuan Qiu, Ph.D. President, CCA (Chinese Communication Association) <http://cca1.org> Co-Editor of *Contracampo: Brazilian J of Comm* special issue, "Platform Labor <https://periodicos.uff.br/contracampo/issue/view/2137/showToc>" Co-Founder, 香港平台合作聯盟 <https://platformhk.coop/>; 合編《平台點合作 <https://bit.ly/2xoVmD9>》 Co-Editor of *Journal of Communication *special issue, "Ferments of the Field <https://academic.oup.com/joc/issue/68/2>"
participants (3)
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Christian Sandvig -
Jack Qiu -
Sarah Ann Oates