We’ve written twice before about the racist impact of DUO’s student fraud detection efforts. The Dutch government has now decided to pay back all the fines and the study financing they held back for all students that were checked between 2012 and 2023.
They expect this to cost 61 million euros for the 10.000 students that are affected. Because of this decision, individual students don’t have to go to court anymore to receive what they are due. Unfortunately, a lot of the damages can’t be repaired just through financial means.
On the same day as this decision, the Dutch Data Protection Authority came out with a report (PDF) concluding that DUO’s methodology was indeed both directly and indirectly discriminatory.
We can only hope that public institutions will take note of the lessons that we (should) have learned from this costly fiasco.
See: Gecontroleerde (oud-)studenten met uitwonendenbeurs krijgen geld terug at DUO and Fraudeaanpak DUO discriminerend en illegaal at Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens.