When it comes to decision making, it might seem that computers are less biased than humans, but algorithms can be just as biased as the people who create them.

Why it matters: One study from MIT Media Lab found that leading facial recognition systems correctly identified male faces 99 percent of the time, but made mistakes up to 35 percent of the time with dark-skinned female faces. This has major consequences for people, because algorithms can help with decisions from who can travel freely to who is arrested and how long they go to jail.