The EU’s R&D process: unaccountable, unethical, even illegal?

European taxpayers likely fund discriminatory technology.


Dr. Gemma Galdon-Clavell is a tech policy analyst working on the social, ethical, and legal impact of data-intensive technologies and algorithmic auditing. She is the Founder and Director of Eticas Consulting and was a 2017 EU Women Innovators Prize finalist. She has ongoing research contracts and grants from the European Commission (FP7 and H2020 programs), the European Agency for Fundamental Rights and the Open Society Foundation, among others. Dr. Galdon-Clavell has led research as a Principal Investigator in more than 10 large projects. She is a scientific and ethics expert at the Directorate General for Research and Innovation at the European Commission and sits on the board of Privacy International and Data & Ethics. She was recently shortlisted for the Booking.com Technology Playmakers Award. Her work is focused on building socio-technical data architectures that incorporate legal, social, and ethical concerns in their conception, production, and implementation. She is a policy analyst by training and has worked on projects relating to Artificial Intelligence and human rights and values, the societal impact of technology, smart cities, privacy, and crisis management tech. Her recent academic publications tackle issues related to the impact of COVID on digitalisation and society, AI and the future of work, the proliferation of data-intensive technologies in urban settings, security and mega-events, and the relationship between privacy, ethics and technology, and smart cities. She completed her PhD on surveillance, security, and urban policy at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, where she also received an MSc on Policy Management, and was later appointed Director of the Security Policy Programme at the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC). Previously, she worked at the Transnational Institute, the United Nations’ Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR) and the Catalan Institute for Public Security. She teaches topics related to her research at several foreign universities and is a member of the IDRC-funded Latin-American Surveillance Studies Network. Additionally, she is a regular analyst on TV, radio, and print media. Previous posts (selected): - Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC) - Institut de Govern i Polítiques Públiques (IGOP-UAB) - United Nations (UNITAR) - Catalan Institute for Public Security (ISPC) - Transnational Institute (TNI) - Department of Applied Economics (UAB) Teaching: - Security and Technology (Universitat de Girona) - Technology and Privacy (Universitat de Girona) - Public policy (Universidad Autónoma de Ciudad Juárez, Mexico) - Urban Management (Erasmus Universiteit, Rotterdam) Media: - Contributor at El País http://elpais.com/autor/gemma_galdon_clavell/a/ - Contributor at Eldiario.es http://www.eldiario.es/autores/gemma_galdon_clavell/ - Contributor at PrivacySurgeon.org