And while it may sound sophisticated—COMPAS has 137 variables and a proprietary algorithm—the software performs no better than a simple linear predictor using just two variables.

A widely-used computer software tool may be no more accurate or fair at predicting repeat criminal behavior than people with no criminal justice experience, according to a Dartmouth College study.

Meanwhile, COMPAS, which stands for Correctional Offender Management Profiling for Alternative Sanctions, relies on six variables for assessing risk, according to Equivant, which sells the software.

The study analyzes the Correctional Offender Management Profiling for Alternative Sanctions (COMPAS) software, a package used by court systems to predict the likelihood of recidivism in criminal ...

The research paper compares the commercial COMPAS software against workers contracted through Amazon's online Mechanical Turk crowd-sourcing marketplace to see which approach is more accurate and ...