SYDNEY, Sept. 15 (Reuters) – An Australian university said Wednesday it had asked journal editor Wiley Online Library to withdraw a research study conducted by a former faculty member helping Chinese facial recognition software to better identify ethnic Uighurs.
Curtin University said the study published by academic Wanquan Liu and co-authors at Chinese universities in 2018 was conducted without his knowledge and had breached his code of ethics.
“The academic should have asked for approval of ethics,” the university said in a statement to Reuters in response to a request for comment on the outcome of its internal investigation into the matter.
Liu did not immediately respond to a request for feedback via email.
Wiley said he had previously initiated an investigation that resulted in a note from the editor and an expression of concern to readers in September 2020 about the data contained in the study.
“We take all concerns seriously and re-examine the matter in light of the new information provided by Curtin University,” Wiley said in a statement to Reuters.
Liu and his co-authors said they had collected a set of facial imagery data by hiring hundreds of Uyghur, Tibetan and Korean students from Dalian Minzu University in China.
The study, funded by the Chinese government, said that “facial recognition has great potential for application in border control, customs control and public security.”
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s Four Corners program first reported in 2019 on concern that Uyghur subjects had not given their consent.
Liu worked for Curtin in Western Australia for two decades, funded by an Australian Research Council grant, but left for a new position at Sun Yat-sen University in Shenzhen in May, according to biographical details posted on the website. the Chinese university.
The incident is the latest in a series of controversies related to the investigation of Chinese ethnic profiles on Uighurs, a predominantly Muslim minority group under strong surveillance by authorities in the western Chinese region of Xinjiang.
China denies all allegations of ill-treatment or discrimination in Xinjiang.
Another editor, Springer Nature, has withdrawn two articles on Uighurs for ethical reasons in the past two weeks.
A spokesman for Curtin University told Reuters in an email statement that the investigation had been conducted by Liu informally, without the support of a contract or formal documentation, although the published study acknowledges that works in Curtin’s computer department.
Australian universities have been subjected to government scrutiny by foreign interference through international research collaboration. The Australian research council said in March that security agencies had stepped up review of projects funded by their grants at the country’s universities. Read more
Kirsty Needham Reports; Edited by Simon Cameron-Moore
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