A/75/590
quarter of attempted readouts fail technically, and even if readouts are successful,
most of the evaluation reports are unusable because the set of data reviewed is too
small or otherwise inconclusive. 77 Among 21,505 mobile phones successfully read
out in 2018 and 2019, only about 118 cases, or 0.55 per cent, indicated a
contradiction. 78 Furthermore, since neither the algorithms nor the training data are
known to the public, judges and other decision makers cannot properly assess their
reliability. 79
30. Although regulations such as the European Union’s General Data Protection
Regulation seek to protect data and privacy, some States create exemptions in the
immigration enforcement context. Two submissions noted relevant exemptions from
the General Data Protection Regulation in the Data Protection Act 2018, of the United
Kingdom. 80 Under this “immigration exemption”, an entity with the power to process
data, known as a “data controller”, may circumvent core rights of an individual around
data access if to do otherwise would “prejudice effective immigration control”. 81
These rights include the rights to object to and restrict the processing of one’s data
and the right to have one’s personal data deleted. 82 The exemption also frees data
controllers from their responsibility to provide information to the individuals
concerned when their data are collected, including from other sources, like a school,
employer or local authority. 83 In the United Kingdom, the amended Police Act
empowers not only police but also immigration officers to interfere with mobile
phones and other electronic devices belonging to asylum seekers. 84 Going far beyond
even the data carrier evaluation permitted in Germany, the Crime and Courts Act
2013, of the United Kingdom, enables police and im migration officers to carry out
secret surveillance measures, place bugging devices, and hack and search mobile
phones and computers. 85 The individuals affected will disproportionately be targeted
on national origin grounds when national origin should neve r be a basis for
diminished privacy and other rights.
B.
Discriminatory structures
31. In her report to the Human Rights Council, the Special Rapporteur provided
examples of how the design and use of different emerging digital technologies could
be combined intentionally and unintentionally to produce racially discriminatory
structures that holistically or systematically undermined enjoyment of human rights
for certain groups, on account of their race, ethnicity or national origin, in
combination with other characteristics. In other words, rather than only viewing
emerging digital technologies as capable of undercutting access to and enjoyment of
discrete human rights, she urged that they should also be understood as capable of
creating and sustaining racial and ethnic exclusion in systemic or structural terms. In
this subsection, the Special Rapporteur highlights ways in which migrants, refugees,
stateless persons and related groups are being subjected to technological interventions
that expose them to a broad range of actual and potential rights violations on the basis
of actual or perceived national origin or immigration status.
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77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
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Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.; and submission by Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants.
Submission by Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Submission by Geselleschaft für Freiheitsrechte.
Ibid.
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