Representational image. Wikimedia Commons
Representational image. Wikimedia Commons
New Delhi: The Netherlands is reportedly using a rather ‘fishy’ and illegal algorithm for scoring the people who are applying for visa applications.
An investigation by the NRC and journalism collective Lighthouse Reports claims that the algorithm has profiled millions of visa applicants on the basis of the country of origin, gender, and age. People who are deemed ‘high risk’ are eventually moved to an ‘intensive track’. This can potentially lead to long visa delays or refusal.
According to the NRC, the system is still in use, despite the foreign affairs ministry’s own privacy chief asking it to be dropped.
The report states that the ministry has been using the biased algorithm to evaluate the risk score of short-stay visa applicants who apply to enter the country since 2015. It has also been used for profiling people who apply to enter the Schengen area.
According to the report, Dutch MP Kati Piri told the publications, “Family members of Dutch citizens with a migration background are prevented in all kinds of ways by the foreign affairs ministry from getting a visa for short stays.”
Piri also claimed that regardless of the ministry claims about the system’s efficiency, ‘it is incredibly difficult to get a visa from countries like Morocco and Suriname.’
The child benefit scandal that surfaced in the Netherlands in 2020 is very similar. Thousands of parents were wrongfully classified as fraudsters between 2004 and 2019. Being a dual citizen was one of the signs of a possible fraud risk, and dual nationals’ data were treated illegally and discriminatory, according to DutchNews.nl.
With inputs from agencies
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