Google sets-up advisory panel for guidance on AI ethics

Ethical panel intended to guide Google's corporate policies in AI, facial recognition and machine learning

Google has set up an advisory council to advise it on ethical issues surrounding artificial intelligence (AI), automation and other emerging technologies.

The so-called Advanced Technology External Advisory Council (ATEAC) consists of eight members and includes technology experts and 'digital ethicists'.

The members of the panel are:

• Bubacarr Bah (mathematician);
• William Joseph Burns (former US deputy secretary of state);
• Joanna Bryson (computer science associate professor at the University of Bath);
• Dyan Gibbens (CEO of drone start-up Trumbull);
• Luciano Floridi (digital ethics expert);
• Alessandro Acquisti (behavioural economist and privacy researcher);
• De Kai (natural language processing researcher); and,
• Kay Coles James (public policy expert).

ATEAC will publish a report by the end of 2019, giving recommendations to tech firms and researchers working on automation technologies, such as facial recognition, that have prompted concerns about racial bias and other ethical issues.

The first meeting of ATEAC will be held next month. Thereafter, three more meetings will be held in 2019.

"This group will consider some of Google's most complex challenges that arise under our AI Principles, like facial recognition and fairness in machine learning, providing diverse perspectives to inform our work," Kent Walker, Google's senior vice president for global affairs, wrote in a blog post.

Google is facing intense criticism from experts, public and internal staff over how it intends to use emerging technologies.

Last year, the California-based tech firm announced that it has decided not to renew the contract that it signed with the Pentagon to develop AI to control drones.

Google arrived at the decision after thousands of its employees signed a petition urging the company not to engage in the 'business of war'.

Subsequently, Google published its internal AI principles, which call for the company to be socially beneficial, accountable to people, incorporate privacy design principles and maintain high standards of scientific excellence.

Google has also decided that it won't design or deploy AI in technologies that are likely to cause overall harm and injure people (weapons or surveillance). In addition, it won't develop technologies that go against widely accepted principles of human rights and international laws.

Google has also created an internal 'responsible innovation team' that, according to Walker, has already reviewed hundreds of new launches so far.

Based on the recommendations of the team, Google decided not to sell its facial recognition technology until there has been more debate on the ethical and policy issues relating to the technology.

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