GB will use artificial intelligence to verify the age of migrants: it's a controversy

The British government has signed a contract with a private company to develop and test, starting next year, an artificial intelligence-based age verification system to be deployed at borders, with the aim of detecting adult migrants who present themselves as minors, sparking considerable controversy.

The technology will analyse photographs taken at the time of entry into the UK, according to the Home Office: this will speed up the identification of adult migrants who 'try to circumvent the rules' of the asylum system, after initial tests showed 'promising results in terms of performance and accuracy'.

The deal, worth £322,000, was reached with the British computer company Akhter Computers. Human rights NGOs, starting with Human Rights Watch, have strongly protested, calling on the government to abandon the project, calling it an 'unproven technology' that risks undermining the protections to which vulnerable minors are entitled.

The British Association of Social Workers, the trade association for social workers, has also warned against the use of AI in this area, pointing out that it could generate 'serious safeguarding errors'. The initiative is part of the drastic crackdown on illegal immigration carried out by the Labour executive of Prime Minister Keir Starmer to reduce landings on British shores.