Algorithmic Transparency in view of new Data Protection Regulation: paper by Sant’Anna School law professors published in Oxford Journal of Legal Studies
In December 2017, the Oxford Journal “International Data Privacy Law” published the paper titled “Why a Right to Legibility of Automated Decision-Making Exists in the General Data Protection Regulation” by Gianclaudio Malgieri, PhD student at Free University of Brussels and research affiliate at Sant’Anna School and Giovanni Comandé, Professor of Private Law at Sant’Anna School. The authors proposed a number of legislative steps that, they argue, would improve the transparency and accountability of automated decision-making when the General Data Protection Regulation comes into force in 2018. After the publication (freely available online), the paper was downloaded 2100 times and has been cited by Oxford, Yale and Harvard academics.
In the upcoming General Data Protection Regulation, the importance of accountability and transparency, as guiding protection principles, is emphasized. The paper argues that the GDP Regulation lacks precise language as well as explicit and well-defined rights and safeguards against harmful automated decision-making. Since decision-makers, both in the private and in the public sector, increasingly rely on algorithms operating on personal data, special mechanisms of accountability become necessary to clarify the ethical importance of algorithmic mediation. In particular, the GDPR creates a new right to data portability to access and transmit data in a machine-readable format that will support the free flow of personal data in the EU.
This paper aims at discussing the right to data portability and its scope. The purpose is to give people more control over the personal data, which is closely related to the recent case involving Facebook and Cambridge Analytica in the context of digital platforms strategies and data misuse. The resulting gap between the operation of algorithms and their ethical implications can have consequences affecting individuals, and society.
