Some advocates are concerned about privacy and bias but those behind the project insist it is just one tool to help determine who might need help
Downtown Ottawa on June 6, 2023. Homelessness has become increasingly visible in recent years in the streets below Parliament Hill.How old are you? What is your gender? Are you Indigenous? Are you a Canadian citizen? Do you have a family?
The researcher developing the Ottawa project, Majid Komeili, said the system uses personal data such as age, gender, Indigenous status, citizenship status and whether the person has a family on record. That information is available in the first place because people are already “highly tracked” in order to receive various benefits or treatments, argued McGill University associate professor said Renee Sieber.
Chronic homelessness means an individual has been homeless for more than six months, or has experienced repeated episodes of homelessness over that time frame. “There is a master list that includes the linkages between the identifier codes and user identities. AI training and testing operate solely on the coded dataset. The master list is stored separately on a secure server with restricted access,” Komeili explained.
Nguyen said the city is currently conducting “internal testing and validation” and plans to consult with the shelter sector and clients before implementing the model, with consultations planned for late fall. One long-acknowledged problem with AI is that its analysis is only as good as the data that is fed into it. That means when data come from a society with systemic racism built into its systems, AI predictions can perpetuate it.If an AI system were to automatically give someone a higher score once they come into a shelter and identify as Indigenous, though, “there’s a lot of ethical issues with taking that approach,” Turner argued.
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