New Records Obtained by EFF Expose More Problems with Medicare’s AI Experiment
The Electronic Frontier Foundation has released a new batch of government records about WISeR, Medicare's AI-driven prior authorization system, following a lawsuit it filed earlier this year seeking information about the program. The records add to earlier findings that the system has caused care delays, denials, and reported patient harm.
Why this matters: Medicare covers tens of millions of older and disabled Americans. When an AI model decides whether your treatment gets approved, and that model is generating delays and denials, the stakes are not abstract. You may not even know an algorithm made the call. The EFF had to sue the government just to see how the system works. That is the accountability gap here: a federal program using automated decision-making on medical care, with limited public transparency and no clear legal guardrails around when and how AI can override a doctor's judgment.
Who should care: Lawyers · Privacy officers · Compliance · AI governance · Administrators · General readers · Policy
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