Chinese authorities use AI to analyse emotions of Uyghur prisoners

Chinese law enforcement agencies use AI systems to analyse the emotions of Uighur prisoners in Xinjiang Autonomous Region.

The name of the company for which the programmer works was not disclosed. However, an informer provided the BBC with five photographs of Uyghur prisoners testing the emotion recognition system.

According to the source, the artificial intelligence system is trained to detect and analyse even the smallest changes in facial and skin expression. The program creates a pie chart showing the proportion of a person’s negative or anxiety state. According to the programmer, the software was intended for “a preliminary court decision without any reliable evidence.”

Uyghurs usually have to provide DNA samples to local authorities, undergo digital scans, and most of them have to download a government phone app that collects data, including contact lists and text messages. Most of the data is entered into a computer system called the Integrated Joint Operations Platform, designed to detect suspicious behaviour.

The system collects information on dozens of different types of perfectly legal behaviour, including whether people exit through the back door instead of the front door, or whether they fill up gas in a car that does not belong to them.

These materials were presented to Sophie Richardson, the Chinese director of Human Rights Watch.

Human rights activists believe that with artificial intelligence, Chinese citizens cannot rely on any kind of privacy.

Let me remind you that we also wrote that China officially legalized the “Social Credit System”, as well as that the Chinese authorities use the Tianfu Cup as a source of exploits.