‘Minority Report’ Becomes Reality: British Authorities to Create Algorithm to Find Potential Killers

The UK Ministry of Justice is developing an algorithm to identify people who are likely to become murderers. The Homicide Prediction Project uses data from UK police forces – likely including information on victims, witnesses and suspects.

The existence of the project was discovered by the human rights organisation Statewatch through Freedom of Information Act requests. Based on the documents provided, the human rights activists concluded that the program was developed based on police data relating to a group of between 100,000 and 500,000 people. The reports cover sensitive issues such as mental health, addiction to illegal substances, suicide and disability. The initiative threatens to “reinforce and increase the structural discrimination that underlies the criminal justice system,” the human rights activists are sure.

«”This project is for research purposes only. It has been developed using existing HM Prison and Probation Service and police data on convicted offenders to help us better understand the risk of people on probation committing serious violence. The report will be published in due course,” a Ministry of Justice spokesman told the Guardian.