UK Goes Full 'Minority Report' With 'Murder Prediction' System

In a page ripped right out of Tom Cruise’s hit Minority Report, the UK government is secretly working on a “murder prediction” system.

UK charity Statewatchdiscovered the project through freedom of information requests, which included Ministry of Justice (MOJ) Data Protection Impact Assessment, Internal Risk assessment and Data Sharing with GMP (Greater Manchester Police).

The documents reveal a startling amount of data that has already been shared in an effort to build the tool

The Data Sharing Agreement between the MoJ and GMP for the Homicide Prediction Project notes that data on between 100,000 and 500,000 people was shared by the force to develop the tool.

The MoJ says in the documents that the project is intended to “[e]xplore the power of MOJ datasets in relation to assessment of homicide risk.” [5] The MoJ Data Science team then “develops models” seeking “the powerful predictors in the data for homicide risk”. [6] The documents refer to the “future operationalisation” of the system. [7]

The GMP data used by the MoJ to develop the tool includes information on hundreds of thousands of suspects, victims, witnesses, missing people, and people for whom there are safeguarding concerns.

As Statewatchpoints out, this is a disturbing development, the ramifications of which will be far-reaching.

“The Ministry of Justice’s attempt to build this murder prediction system is the latest chilling and dystopian example of the government’s intent to develop so-called crime ‘prediction’ systems,” said Sofia Lyall, a Researcher for Statewatch said.

“Time and again, research shows that algorithmic systems for ‘predicting’ crime are inherently flawed. Yet the government is pushing ahead with AI systems that will profile people as criminals before they’ve done anything.

“This latest model, which uses data from our institutionally racist police and Home Office, will reinforce and magnify the structural discrimination underpinning the criminal legal system. Like other systems of its kind, it will code in bias towards racialised and low-income communities. Building an automated tool to profile people as violent criminals is deeply wrong, and using such sensitive data on mental health, addiction and disability is highly intrusive and alarming.

“The Ministry of Justice must immediately halt further development of this murder prediction tool. Instead of throwing money towards developing dodgy and racist AI and algorithms, the government must invest in genuinely supportive welfare services. Making welfare cuts while investing in techno-solutionist ‘quick fixes’ will only further undermine people’s safety and wellbeing.”

UK Becoming More Privacy Invasive Than China

The “murder prediction” tool is just the latest evidence that UK lawmakers seem hell-bent on become one of the most privacy invasive jurisdictions in the world, even leapfrogging China in some ways.

The UK was recently outed for its secret order designed to force Apple to give UK law enforcement a backdoor into the company’s encrypted iCloud backups, not just for the UK but for anyone in the world, regardless of whether they were UK citizens or not.

In response to the order, Apple disabled end-to-end encryption for all UK users, honoring its promise to never build a backdoor for anyone. While a drastic measure, this gives Apple users the opportunity to use an encryption tool of their choice—such as Cryptomator or VeraCrypt—rather than relying on a compromised Apple option.

Apple has continued to fight the order, with a court agreeing that the government cannot hide behind secrecy and giving Apple the ability to discuss the case publicly.

At the same time, the UK has begun rolling out “permanent facial recognition cameras.” In contrast, even China has recently outlawed facial recognition without consent, a stark departure from the UK’s actions.

Now with the UK developing its “murder prediction” tool, it’s hard to argue against the country quickly becoming one of the most privacy invasive jurisdictions in West, one that seems to think Minority Reportwas an admirable blueprint for the future, rather than a dystopian warning.