Topic: Algorithmic Accountability

The Accountability Sink

Approx. 15 min read

Wend Osei's job is to be the human face of blame. When an algorithmic system harms someone, he signs the report, apologizes on camera, and absorbs the penalty, and he is very, very good at contrition. Over the years the line between performing responsibility and believing it begins to blur. Then a case crosses his desk in which a real person, with a license and a choice, actually caused a death, and he discovers the courts no longer have any language for anyone but him.