Google Quietly Disbanded Another AI Review Board Following Disagreements (wsj.com)

Google is disbanding a panel in London to review its artificial-intelligence work in health care, WSJ reported Monday, as disagreements about its effectiveness dogged one of the tech industry's highest-profile efforts to govern itself. From a report: The Alphabet unit is struggling with how best to set guidelines for its sometimes-sensitive work in AI -- the ability for computers to replicate tasks that only humans could do in the past. It also highlights the challenges Silicon Valley faces in setting up self-governance systems as governments around the world scrutinize issues ranging from privacy and consent to the growing influence of social media and screen addiction among children. AI has recently become a target in that stepped-up push for oversight as some sensitive decision-making -- including employee recruitment, health-care diagnoses and law-enforcement profiling -- is increasingly being outsourced to algorithms. The European Commission is proposing a set of AI ethical guidelines and researchers have urged companies to adopt similar rules. But industry efforts to conduct such oversight in-house have been mixed. Further reading: Google Cancels AI Ethics Board In Response To Outcry.

Comments

Why would we trust them?

[Anonymous Coward]

But industry efforts to conduct such oversight in-house have been mixed.

Sorry, but why would we trust multi-billion dollar companies to self regulate, when their clear goal is maximizing profits and getting as much of your data as possible.

I wouldn't trust any company to self regulate, let alone anything like Google or Facebook who have demonstrated time and time again they don't care about your privacy.

We need to be regulating them, not just trusting they'll do the right thing ... because we know they won't.

Re:Why would you trust the men with guns?

[alvinrod]

Google is a little duplicitous in its dealings. Its real customers, the advertisers know exactly what they're getting and what the terms are, but the people having their data sucked up aren't always told what's happening and are often quite horrified when they find out what companies like Google, Facebook, etc. have collected about them.

I don't particularly trust either group. I think the best approach is to enshrine certain guarantees of privacy into the constitution or law and let the men with gavels smack them around for non-compliance.

Way too simplistic

[SuperKendall]

Sorry, but why would we trust multi-billion dollar companies to self regulate

Because if they do not they die, or are punished rather badly.

their clear goal is maximizing profits

Here's the problem with being afraid of that - you have no idea what that actually means. In fact, even GOOGLE does not know what that really means.

No-one knows what actions would truly "maximize profits". Certainly not the people outside the company's top execs who have no inkling of the roadmap for the company, and very little ability to understand what will even be possible in five years or longer. But for those inside the company, even then actions are just an educated guess.

So companies may be trying to "maximize profits" but since there is no one sure way to do so, instead what they are really doing is trying to follow a mission statement to move a company forward toward one or more end goals. Often those goals can have some altruistic purpose to help people, alongside the goal to help the company.

getting as much of your data as possible.

Some but not all, Google for sure this is indeed true of.

We need to be regulating them

Oh so you'd like the citation much worse? You'd like all other companies to end up like pharmaceutical companies, the most heavily regulated industry there is?

The problem with using regulation as the only tool to shape company actions is that if a company is large enough it can easily control the regulations that supposedly control them. Then not only can they do what they like without worry about government, but they use regulations as a tool to ensure competitors cannot function well, thereby removing the only real force that actually changes company behavior - market pressure. If you can't have some small company come up and compete against you, a company will do what it likes forever - the more regulation the better.

Re:Way too simplistic

[GameboyRMH]

The 737 Max 8 disaster should be the final nail in the coffin of the idiotic idea of self-regulation. Boeing didn't stop themselves from making relatively basic mistakes even though they knew it could cost them dearly, which it did. How could anyone continue to defend self-regulation after this?

Re:Way too simplistic

[ceoyoyo]

That agency, the FAA, delegated some of its regulatory oversight tasks to Boeing. The GP's comment is insightful: it was considered critical to have independent oversight, so a government agency was set up. That agency decided to compromise on its oversight responsibility in favour of a small degree of self-regulation, and disasters occurred.

Companies can (and do) set up advisory boards, but those are advisory only. Real regulation must be imposed by an independent body with legal power to do so.

Expected behavior

[rossz]

This is what happens when a significant majority of your workforce does not wish to hear any opposing viewpoints and actively punish anyone who does not toe the party line. They create a self-imposed echo chamber so that "all is well" in their tiny little world.