Talk

On an e-commerce project, we once celebrated when our automated suite crossed ten thousand tests. It looked like success: dashboards glowing green, charts pointing up, a sense of safety. But then a promotion went live that quietly excluded users from certain regions. Nobody caught it because our automation was checking functionality, not fairness. The failure was embarrassing and costly.

That incident forced me to rethink automation. We had fallen into the trap of chasing numbers. More tests did not mean better coverage. The suite was wide but shallow, and its blind spots were amplified at scale. The real problem was not the tool but our assumptions. We had never stopped to ask whether our checks reflected ethical, inclusive quality.

Through trial and error, we learned to weave ethics into our automation strategy. We paired with business analysts to ask, “Who might this exclude?” We added exploratory sessions focused on vulnerable users. We adjusted priorities so that relevance mattered more than volume. Over time, our automation became leaner, sharper, and more trustworthy.

At PeersCon, I want to share how testers can lead in making automation not only efficient but also ethical. Tools cannot replace judgment. If we want automation to be a safety net rather than an illusion, we need to challenge what we measure and design suites with fairness in mind.