Slashdot Mirror
Facebook Spares Humans By Fighting Offensive Photos With AI (techcrunch.com)
An anonymous reader writes from a report via TechCrunch: Facebook tells TechCrunch that its artificial intelligence systems now report more offensive photos than humans do. Typically when users upload content that is deemed offensive, it has to be seen and flagged by at least one human worker or user. Such posts that violate terms of service can include content that is hate speech, threatening or pornographic; incites violence; or contains nudity or graphic or gratuitous violence. The content that workers have to dig through is obviously not great, and may lead to various psychological illnesses such as post-traumatic stress disorder. AI is helping to eliminate such a terrible job as it can scan images that are uploaded before anyone ever sees them. Facebook's AI already "helps rank News Feed stories, read aloud the content of photos to the vision impaired and automatically write closed captions for video ads that increase view time by 12 percent," writes TechCrunch. Facebook's Director of Engineering for Applied Machine Learning Joaquin Candela tells TechCrunch, "One thing that is interesting is that today we have more offensive photos being reported by AI algorithms than by people. The higher we push that to 100 percent, the fewer offensive photos have actually been seen by a human." One risk of such an automated system is that it could censor art and free expression that may be productive or beautiful, yet controversial. The other more obvious risk is that such a system could take jobs away from those in need.
Skynet get to control what I'm posting. That will end well.
"The other more obvious risk is that such a system could take jobs away from those in need."
Social Media Nipple Checkers Local 857, like my father and his father before him.
It's hard work on the Internet nippleface but we're a proud people.
Some people might say it's false drama, lamenting the decline of an industry that only goes back a dozen years but we original "ought fourer families" as we like to call ourselves have never known any other way.
I have friends in who were Internet Radio DJs for the four hours that was a thing until smart playlists replaced them. Many of them have never found employment since.
Problem is, 99.7% o9f those 'offensive' photos are moms breastfeeding their kids.
They taught AI religion?
Well, I guess we now know *why* Skynet will attempt to destroy us.
So, what is the penalty when this improperly flags images and who exactly is held accountable?
One thing that is interesting is that today we have more offensive photos being reported by AI algorithms than by people
Isn't that called false-positive?
Why not just hire those people that graphic images don't affect?
Their lack of empathy might not let them get many jobs outside of the TSA, but they'll follow the rules precisely.
Personally, I wouldn't want to do it, but not because of the graphicness of the images, but because it's low paid and I'd find it really boring.
Probably want to set up an office image bingo card 'come on, nipple, nipple, dick pic, beheading....Yes! BINGO!!"
What is missing in the Slashdot summary is the misery of the human "digital sanitation workers", who usually have to sort that crap out. There has been some recent reporting on these unfortunate people. I believe this reporting is the reason why Facebook has come forward to show their effort, in order to counter the possible negative impact, if this hits US media outlets.
The German political foundation "Heinrich BÃll Stiftung" did a workshop on this phenomenon. Unfortunately there is little English language reporting I found, as for now. Here is a link to the original source (the workshop):
https://calendar.boell.de/de/e...
But one of the presentations is in English and available on Youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
A couple facts:
- the service is called Commercial Content Moderation
- 150.000 people work in this industry in the Philippines alone
- the Philippines is the major site for this job, because while being cheap, they being Christian means they are supposed to have a good sense of what is considered appropriate content in the USA and Europa
- a lot of the workers report "issues" because of the extreme content they have to endure, including relationship problems and substance abuse
- they are not allowed to work longer than 24 month in this job, supposedly because of the issue mentioned above
I've seen absolutely horrible things on the internet and I don't have PTSD.
People are different, and one of the great achievements of modern society is that we have developed a culture that shows some level of consideration to even the weakest members of society. And to be fair - there is always a possibility that it isn't the more sensitive that are too sensitive, but the less sensitive that are simply too callous. And in practical terms, if you really enjoy watching graphical portrayals of cruelty, then you will be able to find it, even if it isn't readily available, whereas if you don't, and it is everywhere, then your only option would be to stay away from most of the web; the burden, if you want to avoid something that is everywhere is vastly bigger than the burden of having to find something that isn't readily available.
More like after seeing beheadings, extreme animal abuse, snuff etc.
-=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
Can't wait for that day when FB finally reveals it's true goals - to become the worlds gatekeeper to all knowledge...
If humans ALLOW a damn social media network to be or become the world gatekeeper to all knowledge, then we get what we deserve.
That's like hiring the National Enquirer to help teach world history. It would be impossible to discern fact from bullshit. Ever.
I find Donald Trump offensive. Your move, Facebook.
Seeing the odd horrible picture probably won't hurt anyone. But having to make a decision to censor or not, thinking about the intent and the context, that is a heavier burden. Now multiply that by a thousand and make it someone's job... It's a well-known problem in police departments that have to go through and catalogue child pornography collections; people on that job don't last very long as a rule.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
Dey duuk arr duuuur!
Still more validation of my intuitive avoidance of social networking sites. I'm eternally grateful that there are still some people left who actually meet and talk in person. We may be a dying breed, but at least we'll die as human beings.
Scruting the inscrutable for over 50 years.
Remember when newly inaugurated Pres. Obama thought it'd be a good idea for FB login to be your official ID?
Nope, and the link you provided doesn't say he did. In fact what he suggested is something that many nerds have been asking for.
Imagine you could create pseudo-anonymous identities. You could have them signed by trusted government agencies to say that they have confirmed your real identity, without the need to necessarily share it with other organizations. If it gets compromised I can mark it as dead and set up a new one. Make it distributed, maybe block chain based.
He didn't suggest Facebook at all. You made that up entirely.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
I hadn't thought about it like that, but you're right: it is one thing to close a window quickly with something awful, but to have to consider the image you're going to have to wrap your mind around something awful for far longer.
I've been more traumatized by not seeing boobs when I hoped I would. :(
I was just about to see them, but then something happened and didn't. I was depressed for weeks.
Seeing boobs would have uplifted me and buoyed my spirits.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
So was it humans performing their job well or AI performing its job well when Tess Monster got her fetid flabulence deleted last week? If the machines did it, at least it shows that skynet has decent aesthetic taste.
Eloi are stupid, throw morlocks at them!
If my Googling concerning "The Right to Refuse Service" laws in the US is correct, it is not legal to refuse service outside of the law (anti-discrimination laws on multiple levels) or arbitrarily or inconsistently. Focusing on the latter two, this means that any refusal of service must be "classifiable" or in other words there must be a set of lawful "refusal rules" that CAN be adhered to BEFORE requesting the service. In as far as I understand neural networks and deep learning that requirement isn't met by this Facebook system. There isn't a certainty based on human intelligible rules that service will or won't be granted. The rules stated by Facebook aren't actually the rules that govern the AI making the decision to grant or deny service. The actual rules (weights) that govern that system are actually unknown, it doesn't really "know" the rules, it performs a function that amounts more to "like this" with "this margin". Neither the "like this" nor "the margin" are human intelligible. Before people start saying 99.9% etc. please remind yourself that there is a big difference between a "human making an error in judgement" and an "unaccountable AI that freaks out without actually knowing why" in the eyes of the law. Technically the same argument holds for possible illegality of self driving cars with a NN or DL AI system. The system can't tell me WHY a certain action is OK or NOT OK. But that is a different story.
"its artificial intelligence systems now report more offensive photos than humans do."
Then either the AI is more easily offended than humans, or there's simply less humans working. Maybe if they hadn't fired the whole department last month (except for one guy).
That's what we do here: We talk about a how a particular unit has been less productive so we can cut more heads, of course, knowing that the unit is less productive because we've already reduced them to a skeleton crew. And that's how MBA's get their bonuses while other people get pink slips.
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
How are they going to find enough pornographic images to properly train the system?
one of the great achievements of modern society is that we have developed a culture that shows some level of consideration to even the weakest members of society.
some level of consideration to even the weakest members of society.
I'd say our biggest problem is that we have shown too much consideration to those who choose to be offended and upset by even the most mundane of things. Reality hardens an individual. While we may not all be ready to be soldiers on the front lines, I would think it reasonable to expect a human being to be able to maintain some degree of sanity after being exposed to some of the darker truths of this world.
I found another presentation from the same speaker. This video is 28 minutes long:
https://re-publica.de/16/sessi...
Or perhaps we would all benefit from having more people too wussy to make the choices which make reality terrible. Because I've witnessed an awful lot of terrible things - such as poverty - being blamed on forces outside human control despite being the direct consequences of choices people make. It's you who should man up and stop being part of the problem, Anon.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
If it's posted on Facebook, it almost always falls into two categories: inane or offensive. So, a very simple algorithm for avoiding photos you don't want to see is... to quit Facebook.
one of the great achievements of modern society is that we have developed a culture that shows some level of consideration to even the weakest members of society.
some level of consideration to even the weakest members of society.
I'd say our biggest problem is that we have shown too much consideration to those who choose to be offended and upset by even the most mundane of things. Reality hardens an individual. While we may not all be ready to be soldiers on the front lines, I would think it reasonable to expect a human being to be able to maintain some degree of sanity after being exposed to some of the darker truths of this world.
Nanny state needs people to be raised soft. Otherwise they wouldn't need nanny state. As it is, in these Western countries where grown adults are as naive and pathetic as toddlers, nanny state has actually come to be necessary; without nanny state they'd go 'Lord of the Flies' in a week and be worshiping pigs heads on sticks.
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
That's... an interesting opinion. I think there's likely a considerable amount of truth in it. I'd mod you up for it if I had points today.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
I've heard the current sentiment described as "tyranny of the minority".
PTSD from looking at images on the screen of a computer? Seriously??
Yes, seroiusly. PTSD does not arise from the graveness of the danger you were in, but from the feeling of complete loss of control and the prolonged state of emotional stress you are subjected to, so it is quite credible that you can get PTSD from something that most people would not be affected by. Are people too sensitive, if they are affected that much? Perhaps - but what would you do? Lock them up just so you don't feel that too much consideration is given to them? It doesn't cost most people a lot to show a bit of consideration, so why make a fuss about it? If you really want to find this kind of things, you can do so with relatively little effort, even if they were somewhat restricted in availability.