Tech

How Government AI Stole Hundreds of Millions of Dollars From Citizens

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It almost reads like a dystopian plot from a sci-fi novel, playing out in the not-so-distant future.

A major world government relies on a defective and cruel algorithm for debt collection, to extort money out of its most vulnerable citizens who were already on social assistance. Or to put it more succinctly: state-sponsored shakedowns via Artificial Intelligence, that ends up being so flawed it results in the country taking hundreds of millions of dollars from its own people.

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Sounds unreal, right? Well, this actually happened in Australia, a major country with a huge economic footprint around the world. For more on the story we’ve got Motherboard editor and reporter Jordan Pearson on CYBER.