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Canada's 'Random' Immigration Lottery Uses Microsoft Excel, Which Isn't Actually Random (gizmodo.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Last year, Canada introduced a new lottery system used to extend permanent-resident status to the parents and grandparents of Canadian citizens. The process was designed to randomly select applicants in order to make the process fairer than the old first-come, first-served system. There's just one problem: the software used to run the lottery isn't actually random. The Globe and Mail reported the Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) uses Microsoft Excel to run the immigration lottery to select 10,000 people for permanent resident status from a field of about 100,000 applications received each year. Experts warned that the random number generating function in Excel isn't actually random and may put some applicants at a disadvantage.
First, it's best to understand just how the lottery system works. An Access to Information request filed by The Globe and Mail shows that IRCC inputs the application number for every person entering the lottery into Excel, then assigns them a random number to each using a variation of the program's RAND command. They then sort the list from smallest to largest based on the random number assigned and take the first 10,000 applications with the lowest numbers. The system puts a lot of faith in Excel's random function, which it might not deserve. According to Universite de Montreal computer science professor Pierre L'Ecuyer, Excel is "very bad" at generating random numbers because it relies on an old generator that is out of date. He also warned that Excel doesn't pass statistical tests and is less random than it appears, which means some people in the lottery may actually have a lower chance of being selected than others.
First, it's best to understand just how the lottery system works. An Access to Information request filed by The Globe and Mail shows that IRCC inputs the application number for every person entering the lottery into Excel, then assigns them a random number to each using a variation of the program's RAND command. They then sort the list from smallest to largest based on the random number assigned and take the first 10,000 applications with the lowest numbers. The system puts a lot of faith in Excel's random function, which it might not deserve. According to Universite de Montreal computer science professor Pierre L'Ecuyer, Excel is "very bad" at generating random numbers because it relies on an old generator that is out of date. He also warned that Excel doesn't pass statistical tests and is less random than it appears, which means some people in the lottery may actually have a lower chance of being selected than others.
It doesn't matter whether the "RND" function is ideally random in a mathematical sense. It only matters whether the "random" number generated is independent of the identities of the people applying to be admitted.
The story is about an issue that is completely irrelevant.
It doesn't matter whether the "RND" function is ideally random in a mathematical sense. It only matters whether the "random" number generated is independent of the identities of the people applying to be admitted.
It isn't even that. Just because the distribution of random numbers isn't random it doesn't mean the sort order based on that isn't random. For example, suppose my random number generator only put out numbers divisible by 1/(2^16) which is what a finite precision binary based system is going to do. This distribution isn't random because it's zero density at many possible floating point values. Yet the sort order might be perfectly random.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
These days the main libertarian issue is to get rid of Obamacare and let people simply die when they get sick.
"Think of it as evolution in action," that's their catch-phrase.
--say, we may need those immigrants after all!
It worse than that "I am okay, so nobody needs it", until things are not so rosey and then it is "what happened to the free market that was meant down health care prices?"
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
Unless they let entrants pick where they are in the list, it doesn't matter if the random number generator is not completely fair.
Maybe it's biased such that entrants 50,000 - 51,000 are much more likely to end up sorted to the top, but unless the entrants can choose where they are in the list, I don't see why that really matters. Sure, someone that controls the list could move their friends to that range to make them more likely to end up at the top, but they could also move their friends to whatever random numbers and up at the top.
Actually, I've seen exactly the opposite analysis.
Democratic politicians want more legal immigration but less illegal immigration. Legal immigrants vote and pay taxes, illegals don't.
Republican politicians want less legal immigration, but more illegal immigration. Illegal immigration depresses wages, meaning more profits for corporations. (Even if the corporations don't hire illegals, the illegals have a downward pressure on all unskilled-labor wages).
The story is about an issue that is completely irrelevant.
It doesn't matter whether the "RND" function is ideally random in a mathematical sense. It only matters whether the "random" number generated is independent of the identities of the people applying to be admitted.
With no intention of diminishing the importance of your statement; that is blindingly obvious. There are two other excellent points raised by others in the comments here: that imperfect randomness does not make the process manipulable by immigration candidates and that sort order of assigned imperfect random numbers can itself be perfectly random.
The story is mis-reported as a scandal; there is in fact no scandal whatsoever. So who made up the fake news? Tom Cordoso is the author of the original story at the Globe and Mail which the Gizmodo article linked in the Slashdot summary cites. Cordoso quotes Université de Montréal computer-science professor Pierre L’Ecuyer as saying “Anything would be better” [Than the Excel random number generator] but, crucially, Cordoso omits the context of that comment. Was L’Ecuyer referring to its suitability for this particular method and application, or was he commenting on its suitability for general use, including, for example cryptography? In neither the Gizmodo nor Globe and Mail articles can I find any mention of an expert unambiguously expressing judgment on the immigration randomization method specifically. A close reading suggests that the criticism originates with the journalist, and that he deceptively implies it to be the opinion of experts.
Some enterprising citizen journalist should contact the cited experts and ask them 1) Did their comments refer to general usage of the Excel random number generator or specifically to the immigration randomization methodology. 2) What is their opinion of the immigration randomization methodology 3) Do they agree with the points made here about it being a nothingburger 4) Have they read the Globe and Mail article, if so do they believe that their comments were wrongly contextualized.
If anyone does that, it would be nice to see a followup article here on Slashdot.
Ceci n'est pas une signature.
Must be nice to be ignorant of history. Mexico had alot of problems that were never replicated in the US. Spanish and English colonization was very different. Your remarks remind me of the times my Mother used to tell me that Israel turned desert into farmland. Remarkably ignorant of history.
Everyone has their cross to bear but at some point they have to move on. I'm aware of history but I neither use it as an excuse nor an accusation. All countries have behaved badly in some ways at some times, are we all victims or do we move on and try and make things better?