Although you are out of prison, your incarceration and contact with the criminal legal system will follow you as you search for jobs, housing, loans and other services. The stigma of incarceration has social and legal consequences, making it more difficult — and sometimes impossible — to vote, get hired, access government-funded housing or food stamps, or receive federal student grants. Being out of prison does not mean you are out of reach of algorithmic decision-making, which is increasingly built into all the commercial systems and institutional bureaucracies that mediate access to the benefits and services essential to human thriving — including health care, insurance, housing, education, credit and lending.

The data produced about you while you were incarcerated extends further into other parts of your life, while at the same time data from your everyday life is increasingly accessible to police. The result is a web of surveillance that expands the boundaries of the US’ systems of policing and punishment, making it more and more difficult for those who are targeted by those systems to find real freedom.

Check out the paper and appendix for more information.