UK sham marriage tool found to disproportionately flag Greeks, Albanians, Bulgarians and Romanians

A UK Home Office AI-powered tool intended to identify potential sham marriages may discriminate against people from Albania, Greece, Romania and Bulgaria, according to reports.

An internal Home Office evaluation (pdf) obtained through a freedom of information revealed issues with the 'triage' process, including the possibility of 'indirect discrimination' against people of specific nationalities due to potentially biased information that also includes the age gap between partners.

The Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ) reported that an equality impact assessment (EIA) conducted by the Home Office used historical information from marriage referrals received by the Home Office over an unspecified three-year period and that any biases that might exist within this source data are likely to be projected forward by the sham marriage algorithm.

A graph included in the EIA showed the number of marriages that go through the system involving specific nationalities and the percentage of those marriages that are given a red light. According to the graph, the nationalities with the highest rate of triage failure – between 20 percent and 25 percent – are Bulgaria, Greece, Romania and Albania. Those most frequently referred to the triage system include Albania, India, Pakistan and Romania.

Civil rights groups and lawyers argued that the Home Office should allow transparency, independent oversight, and ongoing monitoring and evaluation of its use of algorithms to ensure that its systems are fair and lawful.

➕ February 2023. A legal challenge against an algorithm used to identify potential sham marriages accused the UK Home Office of discriminating against people from certain countries.