ICE Modified Its 'Risk Assessment' Software So It Always Recommends Detention | Hacker News Reader

ICE Modified Its 'Risk Assessment' Software So It Always Recommends Detention

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65 pointsseverine21 comments

This is a perfect example of software engineers doing something extremely unethical, and shouldn’t be able to hide behind “I was just following orders”

I agree. But there are some who think this is the correct thing to do. Without a common standard for ethics within our industry, nationalism and patriotism will win out in enough cases that things like this will continue to occur.

EDIT: Dislike and downvote all you want - it won't change that there are people out there who don't agree with your moral stance.

>But there are some who think this is the correct thing

Yeah well they are wrong. It's not a matter of opinion, at least not with this subject.

What good is diagnostic software if you already know what the result will be? And taxpayers are paying for this sort of rigamarole? How are we to trust anything coming out of any of their mouths?

ICE is completely unethical, thuggish, and a disgrace.

There are some who believe killing anyone, even in a war to protect your own people is a great evil. Are they wrong? If you're a soldier protecting your own people, are you wrong?

Morality depends on your culture, your beliefs, and your own sense of right and wrong. IOW, it's a bit more grey than you present. And whether you think they are wrong or not, it's what they believe.

What is it you think these people believe? I don't mean that they're nationalist or what their attitudes on immigration are, but why they would edit a system to turn out a fake detention recommendation instead of merely changing their policy. There are well-established procedures for changing policy, but patching the risk management system seems like an attempt to circumvent such procedures.

Well, this depends entirely on your ethics.

According to the article, the system previously involved intensive, bureaucratic questioning of undocumented immigrants after which the system would come to some kind of decision.

Since we're dealing with apprehended, undocumented immigrants, I would have no problem whatsoever changing the software to recommend detention. It certainly seems better than a semi-arbitrary decision no human can explain.

The whole idea of letting them go and setting a court date seems preposterous, a waste of everyone's time and resources, and they aren't incentivized to go - if they're willing to enter the country illegally, why would they not be willing to miss a court date? It's just a circus, for show. The whole system is broken - why detain these people at all? They should be deported, not jailed and given a show trial.

You may disagree, and that's fair. I would argue that nations have borders and nobody had a problem with this for centuries. You might argue the world is changing, open borders are the only just and fair thing due to human welfare concerns. But there is a reasonable debate to be had and it seems really glib to dismiss the engineers who did this as people who should be on a nuremberg trial.

I don't actually disagree too much with what you're saying (regarding enforcing borders, etc).

But why have a sham scoring system if you're just going to rig it? That's where the ethics come in. Because you bet your ass that they'd be using the score of this system to justify what are essentially racially motivated actions.

There are arguments to be said that if a lot of these people had a legal way to enter and leave, they actually wouldn't stay the whole time. After all, most people want to be in their homeland and with their culture, and not always feel like second class citizens. But their need for jobs keeps them in a place like here.

If the outcome is predetermined why have the software and perform the evaluation at all? It's taking considerable time and resources to perpetuate a fakery. That's different from simply having a new policy of detaining everyone. Instead, ICE officers are pretending to gather information to make a decision whose outcome was decided in advance. Why is that?

But by what mechanism does the software community achieve moral consensus? Otherwise I wouldn't just assume agreement except on the most basic things, in which case, you could get anyone else to agree with you.

>"Final custody decisions are always made by ICE deportation officers."

ICE seems to be an exception here, isn't? IANAL, my understanding is that for any person in US jurisdiction any decision on bond/custody is supposed to be made by a judge. I mean at least Guantanamo is, by some sleight of hands (for example US flagged vessels aren't while US flagged military base is?), somehow outside US jurisdiction. It seems that ICE actions are also excluded. History has been showing again and again that leaving the things unchecked in the hand of executive power is naturally leading to the abuse of the power.

Where is the proof before we get into any discussion on how this doesn't matter. Immigrant or invader is the first question. immigrant has started the process of LEGAL immigration. opposite is an invader Cause really how many living in northern Mexico can afford to vacation in Texas

Seems like this is being flagged out of the front page (and there's another similar link from boingboing.net), is it for not being original reporting? In that case, the linked article from Reuters is a good original source:

Trump’s catch-and-detain policy snares many who have long called U.S. home: https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-immi...

I saw another article where ice officers pulled kids by there hair to push them into cells.

The article seems to suggest the worst crime most were picked up for is traffic violations. But illegal immigration is a serious crime in and of itself. The crime that triggered them being caught hardly matters in this context.

Unlawful presence (for example, overstaying a visa) is not a crime, and improper entry (sneaking over the border) is a misdemeanor.[0]

0 - https://blogs.findlaw.com/blotter/2014/07/is-illegal-immigra...

Outside of the strict legal definition, it's a crime. This is pedantic and legalistic. Yes, you're technically correct. But most people consider violating the law to be a criminal act, and unlawful presence is breaking the law even if it's civil and not criminal.

People point this out regularly. Everyone either knows, or doesn't care for the reasons I just stated. It doesn't contribute anything to the conversation.

In the context of the parent comment I don't see how this is pedantic and legalistic. superkah was suggesting that being an undocumented immigrant is a serious enough crime to warrant detention. I am asserting that it is not based on the fact that it is a civil crime, or at worst a misdemeanor.

Yes, but the "seriousness" of a crime is not determined by its specific legal definition in the public consciousness, and nobody thinks that it is. For example, few people would argue a small-time weed dealer copping to a felony has committed a more serious crime than someone charged with misdemeanor domestic assault.

In that case, many people don’t consider it a serious crime at all.

That's exactly my point - that's the reason the issue is contentious in the first place. Many people strongly believe it's a serious crime. Many people strong believe there's absolutely nothing wrong with it and the law is unjust. Most people believe something in between.

That's what makes the original comment so unsubstantive, and why I was so critical of it. It doesn't persuade. It's not interesting. It doesn't provide any new information - that same factoid is brought up in almost every discussion about immigration. It sidesteps the whole issue to make a pointless legal argument - very similar to when someone mentions that the First Amendment only protects you government censorship. Yes, everyone knows that, it's not what anyone is arguing about.

The reason I read HN is because many people with many different views write great comments about technical issues. Sometimes we drift off into somewhat less technical issues like this, but often the comment quality remains high. And when it does, it's because we're not writing comments like that.

And to be perfectly fair, my response was clearly not articulated well and also fell into that category - whether I feel that way or not, that's what I take downvotes (it's presently at -4, which I didn't even know was possible) to mean. (Upvotes don't mean the converse, though!) I should have also done better.

Ah, I didn't realize this covered overstaying a visa. Sorry. That's not a serious crime so ICE detaining does seem wrong.

Sneaking over a border being only a misdemeanor surprises me though. The amount of man power, deadly force and investigational power centered around the borders is disproportional to a misdemeanor. Heck, there's even a 100 mile no civil rights zone around all international borders. If it's not a big deal all that stuff has got to go.

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