In its own marketing, sums up its mission like this: “Parents will no longer need to wonder about whether their neighbors, friends, home day care providers, a former spouse’s new love interest or preschool providers can be trusted to care for their children responsibly.”Īccording to preliminary findings of Professor Sweeney’s research, searches of names assigned primarily to black babies, such as Tyrone, Darnell, Ebony and Latisha, generated “arrest” in the ad copy between 75 percent and 96 percent of the time. An examination of Internet advertising starting last March as well as Sweeney’s study did not find any rival companies advertising background searches on individual names along racial lines. legal limitations such as using the information to determine creditworthiness, insurance or job suitability.Ĭompanies that compete with include and. Rapid advances in technology have opened up all sorts of opportunities for commercialization of data.Īnyone can set up shop and sell arrest records as long as they stay clear of U.S. The field is attracting growing attention, both from government and consumers concerned about possible abuse. is one of many data brokers that use and sell data for a variety of purposes. Former employees said they had signed nondisclosure agreements that barred them from speaking openly about Instant Checkmate. Company officials also declined to comment when visited twice at their call center in Las Vegas. The company’s founder and managing partner, Kristian Kibak, did not respond to repeated emails and phone calls over a period of several months, and other employees referred calls to management. The company denies engaging in racial profiling. While was given the opportunity to comment on how it generates ads, for which it declined to comment, citing “trade secrets,” it wasn’t specifically asked about the issue of racial profiling. “I think it’s horrendous that they get away with it.” “As an African-American, I’m used to profiling like that,” said Dr. (The author of this story is a Harvard University fellow collaborating with Professor Sweeney on a book about the business of personal data.)Įbony Jefferson, for example, often turns up an ad reading: “Ebony Jefferson, arrested?” but an ad triggered by a search for Emily Jefferson would read: “We found Emily Jefferson.” Searches for randomly chosen black-identifying names such as Deshawn Williams, Latisha Smith or Latanya Smith often produced the “arrested?” headline or ad text with the word “arrest,” whereas other less ethnic-sounding first names matched with the same surnames typically did not. After learning that her own name had popped up in an “arrested?” ad when a colleague was searching for one of her academic publications, she ran more than 120,000 searches for names primarily given to either black or white children, testing ads delivered for 2,400 real names 50 times each. Latanya Sweeney is a Harvard University professor of government with a doctorate in computer science. A statistical analysis of the company’s advertising has found it has disproportionately used ad copy including the word “arrested” for black-identifying names, even when a person has no arrest record. , which labels itself the “Internet’s leading authority on background checks,” placed both ads. “Latisha Smith, arrested?” reads one such advertisement.Īnother says: “Latisha Smith Truth. Yet someone searching the Web for the Washington State physician might well come across an Internet ad suggesting she may have an arrest record. Latisha Smith, an expert in decompression sicknesses afflicting deep sea divers, has cleared criminal background checks throughout her medical career. (Corrects paragraph 8 to clarify the grounds on which InstantCheckmate declined comment)
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