York Law School Leads $2.5M Grant to Challenge AI in Refugee Adjudication

For legal professionals, the rapid deployment of unregulated AI in immigration and refugee adjudication strikes at the heart of due process and international human rights obligations. This interdisciplinary initiative will arm lawyers, judges, and policymakers with empirical evidence to challenge discriminatory algorithms and demand procedural fairness in an increasingly automated asylum system.

In an era of historic global displacement, border management has increasingly turned to advanced digital surveillance technologies, often with minimal oversight and profound implications for human rights. A new $2.5 million Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Partnership Grant awarded to York University’s Osgoode Hall Law School, announced on July 22, 2026, will fund an international initiative to investigate and mitigate these very dangers. Led by Associate Professor Sean Rehaag, the Algorithmic Justice for Refugees Research Network (AJRRN) aims to scrutinize the use of artificial intelligence and other digital tools in border control, which have been linked to rights violations and entrenched inequalities.

The scale of the challenge is immense. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, over 120 million people are forcibly displaced worldwide in 2026, a record number driven by conflict, persecution, and climate change. Concurrently, governments have erected physical barriers and bolstered enforcement agencies, but they have also embraced a new generation of surveillance technologies. Biometric systems capture and store personal identifiers, automated decision-making tools adjudicate asylum claims with little transparency, lie-detection technologies—often based on questionable science—assess credibility, and drones patrol borders. These tools, frequently developed and sold by private companies, operate with scant regulatory oversight, raising urgent questions about privacy, discrimination, and due process.

The AJRRN project is designed as a global, interdisciplinary network that will bring together legal scholars, technologists, social scientists, and human rights advocates from multiple countries. The research will focus on three core objectives: first, to expose the inequitable and rights-violating impacts of these technologies, especially on already marginalized refugee populations; second, to challenge the dominant private-sector-driven narrative that equates border security with unchecked technological deployment; and third, to co-create and advocate for rights-enhancing, transparent alternatives that uphold international refugee law and human rights standards.

From a legal standpoint, the rise of AI in immigration adjudication poses fundamental challenges to established principles of procedural fairness. Automated decisions that reject refugee claims on the basis of algorithmic risk scores may lack the reasoned justification required by law, while data-driven profiling can reproduce historical biases. The project will provide empirical evidence that could support litigation and policy reform, much as earlier legal scholarship helped rein in other forms of administrative discretion. For instance, Canada’s own Federal Court has seen a surge in cases involving algorithm-assisted decisions, highlighting the need for robust accountability mechanisms.

The cybersecurity implications are equally stark. Border control systems amass vast quantities of sensitive biometric and personal data, creating attractive targets for malicious actors. A breach could expose refugee identities, endangering individuals who may face persecution if their location or status is revealed. Moreover, the fusion of disparate datasets can enable function creep, where data collected for one purpose is repurposed for law enforcement or even political surveillance. The project will examine these vulnerabilities and develop frameworks to ensure that any digital border system incorporates privacy-by-design and strong encryption, protecting both the data subjects and the integrity of the asylum process.

The funding, through SSHRC’s prestigious Partnership Grant program, acknowledges the societal urgency of this work. The involvement of York’s Centre for Refugee Studies, a long-established research hub, provides a critical foundation of expertise, and the collaboration spans academic institutions in the Global North and South, ensuring that the research is grounded in the lived experiences of refugees themselves.