The datafication of refugees: humanitarian agencies & biometrics with Zara Rahman from the Superrr Lab

About this episode

The episode discusses the implications of biometric data collection on refugees and asylum seekers, featuring insights from Zara Rahman.

Biometrics – our fingerprints, faces, irises, for instance – are increasingly used to verify identity. But what happens when this data collection is applied to vulnerable populations, like refugees and asylum seekers, in ways that can remove agency rather than offer them protection? In the humanitarian space, organizations justify biometric data collection in a way to increase efficiency, yet stories have shown that such mechanisms can be weaponized: data handed over to oppressive governments, misidentifications leading to life-altering mistakes, and accountability often falling on the very people humanitarian programs claim to help. Beyond survival depending on data-driven systems, racial capitalism also plays a critical role by reinforcing the same global inequalities that force people to migrate in the first place. Who benefits from implementing biometric data collection in a humanitarian context, and who bears the consequences when it fails? To answer these questions and more, I had the pleasure to talk with Zara Rahman, author of “Machine Readable Me: The Hidden Ways That Technology Shapes Our Identities”, Strategic Advisor at the SUPERRR Lab and Visiting Research…

People in this episode

Host: Activists of Tech

Guest: Zara Rahman

Topics covered

• biometrics
• refugees
• humanitarian agencies
• data collection
• racial capitalism
• technology and justice

Keywords

• biometrics
• refugees
• data collection
• humanitarian
• technology
• racial capitalism
• identity

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Superrr Lab, Citizens and Technology Lab

Books & works: Machine Readable Me: The Hidden Ways That Technology Shapes Our Identities

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