Information Commissioner Warns Companies about ‘Emotional Analysis Technology’

Companies are warned by the information commissioner to avoid “emotional analysis” technologies, or risk being fined due to the “pseudoscientific nature” of this field.

This is the first time that the regulator has issued a blanket warning about the ineffectiveness of new technology. However, Stephen Bonner, the Deputy Commissioner, stated that it was justified by the potential harm to companies if they made decisions based solely on meaningless data.

He said that biometric efforts to detect emotion have attracted a lot of attention and investment. These technologies use data like the shine of someone’s skin or their facial expressions to infer mental state information.

Bonner stated that “Unfortunately, these techniques don’t appear to be supported by science.” “This is quite worrying, as we know of quite a number of organizations looking into this technology to make very important decisions: to determine whether people are fraudsters or if job applicants are qualified for that position. These technologies don’t seem to work.

Bonner stated that using emotional analysis technology alone is not a problem. However, treating it as more than entertainment is. There are many uses for this technology that are mild and fine. If you have a Halloween party where you want to determine who is the most scared, it can be used. Although it’s a costly random number generator, it can still be entertaining.