Cited by 477Ethics and Social Impacts of AINames, Identity, and Discrimination ResearchLaw, Rights, and Freedoms

Discrimination in Online Ad Delivery: Google ads, black names and white names, racial discrimination, and click advertising

Open access
Sweeney, Latanya·2013·Queue

Abstract

Do online ads suggestive of arrest records appear more often with searches of black-sounding names than white-sounding names? What is a black-sounding name or white-sounding name, anyway? How many more times would an ad have to appear adversely affecting one racial group for it to be considered discrimination? Is online activity so ubiquitous that computer scientists have to think about societal consequences such as structural racism in technology design? If so, how is this technology to be built? Let’s take a scientific dive into online ad delivery to find answers.

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  • The history of digital technology shows that broader scrutiny, including by marginalized groups that experience harm most acutely, reveals concerns missed by developers.

    “The history of digital technology demonstrates that broader scrutiny, including by those belonging to marginalized groups that experience harm most acutely, reveals concerns missed by developers (Sweeney, 2013;Noble, 2018;Buolamwini & Gebru, 2018;Raji & Buolamwini, 2019).”

    From On the Societal Impact of Open Foundation Models (2024) · cites this paper as Sweeney, 2013

    In “THE PATTERN” (page unavailable), Sweeney describes investigating arrest-suggestive ads associated with Black-identifying names; the conclusion reports that technology can foster discriminatory outcomes. The paper supports the example of scrutiny revealing racial harm, but it does not establish the broader historical claim or say that participation by marginalized groups revealed concerns developers had missed. (LLM, conf=0.82)

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Research works printed but not linked: 5

  1. [1]1. Barker R. 2003. The Social Work Dictionary (5th ed.). Washington, DC: NASW Press.
  2. [12]12. Panel on Methods for Assessing Discrimination, National Research Council. 2004. Measuring racial discrimination. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.
  3. [15]15. Sweeney, L. 2013. Discrimination in online ad delivery. (For detailed results and analysis, see full technical report archived at http://ssrn.com/abstract=2208240. Data, including Web pages and ads, archived at http://foreverdata.org/onlineads).
  4. [17]17. WebShot Command Line Server Edition. Version 1.9.1.1; http://www.websitescreenshots.com/.
  5. [19]19. LATANYA SWEENEY (latanya@fas.harvard.edu) is professor of government and technology in residence at Harvard University. She creates and uses technology to assess and solve societal, political, and governance problems and teaches others how to do the same. She is also founder and director of the Data Privacy Lab at Harvard. She earned her Ph.D. in computer science from MIT in 2001. More information about her is available at latanyasweeney.org. © 2013 ACM 1542-7730/13/0300 $10.00

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Authors
Sweeney, L.
Affiliations
Harvard University (US)
Corresponding author
Sweeney, Latanya
Venue
Queue
Published
2013-03
Volume
11
Issue
3
Pages
10-29
ISSN
  • 1542-7730 (ISSN-L)
  • 1542-7749
OpenAlex
W2953001331
Cited by
477
References
14
Citations by year
2026: 13 · 2025: 42 · 2024: 34 · 2023: 55 · 2022: 37 · 2021: 53 · 2020: 51 · 2019: 100 · 2018: 31 · 2017: 28 · 2016: 16 · 2015: 5 · 2014: 7 · 2013: 5
FWCI
29.08
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Queue (publishedVersion)
  • SSRN Electronic Journal (publishedVersion)
  • arXiv (Cornell University) (submittedVersion)
  • arXiv (Cornell University)
Funders
  • National Science Foundation (1237235)
  • Institute for Quantitative Social Science, Harvard University
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Safety Research › Ethics and Social Impacts of AI
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Names, Identity, and Discrimination Research
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Law, Rights, and Freedoms
Keywords
algorithmic discrimination, online advertising, Google AdSense, racial bias, name-based discrimination, arrest records, public records, search engine advertising, algorithmic fairness

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