Description: A French welfare office using software to automatically evaluate cases incorrectly notified a woman receiving benefits that she owed €542.
Entities
View all entitiesAlleged: unknown developed an AI system deployed by French Welfare Offices, which harmed Lucie Inland.
CSETv1 Taxonomy Classifications
Taxonomy DetailsIncident Number
The number of the incident in the AI Incident Database.
100
AI Tangible Harm Level Notes
Notes about the AI tangible harm level assessment
No financial harm because the money was given back
AI was not involved in the robo-debt algorithms. Statistics and risk categories were used instead of AI.
Special Interest Intangible Harm
An assessment of whether a special interest intangible harm occurred. This assessment does not consider the context of the intangible harm, if an AI was involved, or if there is characterizable class or subgroup of harmed entities. It is also not assessing if an intangible harm occurred. It is only asking if a special interest intangible harm occurred.
yes
Date of Incident Year
The year in which the incident occurred. If there are multiple harms or occurrences of the incident, list the earliest. If a precise date is unavailable, but the available sources provide a basis for estimating the year, estimate. Otherwise, leave blank.
Enter in the format of YYYY
2021
Risk Subdomain
A further 23 subdomains create an accessible and understandable classification of hazards and harms associated with AI
7.3. Lack of capability or robustness
Risk Domain
The Domain Taxonomy of AI Risks classifies risks into seven AI risk domains: (1) Discrimination & toxicity, (2) Privacy & security, (3) Misinformation, (4) Malicious actors & misuse, (5) Human-computer interaction, (6) Socioeconomic & environmental harms, and (7) AI system safety, failures & limitations.
- AI system safety, failures, and limitations
Entity
Which, if any, entity is presented as the main cause of the risk
AI
Timing
The stage in the AI lifecycle at which the risk is presented as occurring
Post-deployment
Intent
Whether the risk is presented as occurring as an expected or unexpected outcome from pursuing a goal
Unintentional
Incident Reports
Reports Timeline

I live alone and, like many of my generation, I am part of the precariat. As such, I receive several social benefits. The welfare office pays part of my rent and gives me a monthly stipend, which totals about 500€ a month. I’ve been working…
Variants
A "variant" is an incident that shares the same causative factors, produces similar harms, and involves the same intelligent systems as a known AI incident. Rather than index variants as entirely separate incidents, we list variations of incidents under the first similar incident submitted to the database. Unlike other submission types to the incident database, variants are not required to have reporting in evidence external to the Incident Database. Learn more from the research paper.
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