Ethics Boards Won’t Save Big Tech
https://onezero.medium.com/tech-companies-need-an-ethics-reset-4d936a27960e
Andrew MaynardBlockedUnblockFollowFollowingApr 15Photo: Paweł Czerwiński on UnsplashOn March 26, Google announced the formation of an external advisory group to help the company navigate complex questions around the ethical and responsible development of new technologies, including artificial intelligence. By April 4, however, the council had been disbanded, and Google acknowledged that the company was “going back to the drawing board.”
Ironically, Google’s new group of ethics advisors fell apart because of ethical challenges. But apart from underlining just how fragile the current state of technology ethics is, the incident attests to a much larger challenge tech companies are facing: How can a company ensure that the products it develops — especially A.I. — are as good for society as they are for the company’s bottom line?