IBM Takes a Stance on Racial Inequality and Inequity
IBM no longer offers general purpose IBM facial recognition or analysis software and condones use for racial profiling
This is a brave and bold move from one the companies with the most patents on artificial intelligence (AI) in the world – truly a mammoth when it comes to both the development and implementation of AI. The Verge wrote about this two days ago on the 8th of June in their story on the issue.
IBM CEO Arvind Krishna wrote a riveting letter to Congress.
What first struck me was his quote Thomas J. Watson, Jr., then president of IBM, written letter to all employees in September 1953:
” . . .Each Of the citizens of this country has an equal right to live and work in America. It is the policy of this organization to hire people who have the personality, talent and background necessary to fill a given job, regardless of race, color or creed.”
It is hard to say it better, and this was almost 70 years ago.
Then, going on Krishna started making commitments.
Because, further to this he followed up with:
“IBM no longer offers general purpose IBM facial recognition or analysis software. IBM firmly opposes and will not condone uses of any technology, including facial recognition technology offered by other vendors, for mass surveillance, racial profiling, violations of basic human rights and freedoms, or any purpose which is not consistent with our values and Principles of Trust and Transparency.”
Facial recognition technology (FTR) has been controversial to say the least.
However, few of the large companies have gone this far.
At the same time he argued that IBM condones the use of FTR offered by other actors for mass surveillance, racial profiling or violations of human rights.
“We believe now is the time to begin a national dialogue on whether and how facial recognition technology should be employed by domestic law enforcement agencies.”
A bold statement that will reverberate in both the field of AI and the industry.
Despite advances in AI it is still prone to bias along age, race and ethnicity.
Due to all above it can be unreliable and lead to civil rights abuses.
I have written previously about how Joy Buolamwini with the Algorithmic Justice League have been proving this biases over and over again through their work.
Many (if not all) commercial facial recognition systems (including IBM’s) have been biased.
These FTR projects have been applied widely across the United States.
Amazon.com as an example is one of the few major tech companies to sell facial recognition software to law enforcement.
Yet their program Rekognition, the name of the program, has also been criticised heavily for its accuracy.
As mentioned in my previous article about the spread of FTR Clearview AI is another company that has been committing heavy privacy abuses. It was recently sued by The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) that called it a nightmare scenario.
Even Facebook had an unlawful use of FTR and had to settle a class-action lawsuit.
It must be said that in January 2019 IBM took nearly one million photos from Flickr without the consent of the subjects (although they were Creative Commons license).
IBM suggested expanding their P-TECH and Pell Grants.
P-TECH — is developed by IBM and is a grade 9–14 school model where students earn both their high school diploma and a no-cost associates degree in a STEM field without incurring student debt.
Today, 220 P- TECH schools are serving 150,000 students worldwide, with a heavy focus on students of color in educationally underserved areas in the United States.
“At IBM, we see an urgent demand for what we call “new collar” jobs, which require specialized skills but not necessarily a traditional 4-year college degree. Such jobs can still be found today in fast-growing fields from cybersecurity to cloud computing.”
Following this it may be important to consider what other areas that this issue can be considered. One example may be voice recognition.
There is much that has risen to the surface in the debates following the movements around the world for social justice.
I am sure we will see more in the weeks ahead, also in the field of artificial intelligence. Particularly in the application of technologies using advanced forms of machine learning in social interactions or for surveillance.
This is #500daysofAI and you are reading article 372. I am writing one new article about or related to artificial intelligence every day for 500 days. Towards day 400 I am writing about artificial intelligence and racial inequality.
