Is that artificial intelligence ethical? Sony to review all products

NikkeiAsia

Nikkei staff writers

Originally posted 22 Dec 2020

Here is an excerpt:

Sony will start screening all of its AI-infused products for ethical risks as early as spring, Nikkei has learned. If a product is deemed ethically deficient, the company will improve it or halt development.

Sony uses AI in its latest generation of the Aibo robotic dog, for instance, which can recognize up to 100 faces and continues to learn through the cloud.

Sony will incorporate AI ethics into its quality control, using internal guidelines.

The company will review artificially intelligent products from development to post-launch on such criteria as privacy protection. Ethically deficient offerings will be modified or dropped.

An AI Ethics Committee, with its head appointed by the CEO, will have the power to halt development on products with issues.

Even products well into development could still be dropped. Ones already sold could be recalled if problems are found. The company plans to gradually broaden the AI ethics rules to offerings in finance and entertainment as well.

As AI finds its way into more devices, the responsibilities of developers are increasing, and companies are strengthening ethical guidelines.

The info is here.

What Are “Ethics in Design”?

Victoria Sgarro
slate.com
Originally posted August 13, 2018

Here is an excerpt:

As a product designer, I know that no mandate exists to integrate these ethical checks and balances in our process. While I may hear a lot of these issues raised at speaking events and industry meetups, more “practical” considerations can overshadow these conversations in my day-to-day decision making. When they have to compete with the workaday pressures of budgets, roadmaps, and clients, these questions won’t emerge as priorities organically.

Most important, then, is action. Castillo worries that the conversation about “ethics in design” could become a cliché, like “empathy” or “diversity” in tech, where it’s more talk than walk. She says it’s not surprising that ethics in tech hasn’t been addressed in depth in the past, given the industry’s lack of diversity. Because most tech employees come from socially privileged backgrounds, they may not be as attuned to ethical concerns. A designer who identifies with society’s dominant culture may have less personal need to take another perspective. Indeed, identification with a society’s majority is shown to be correlated with less critical awareness of the world outside of yourself. Castillo says that, as a black woman in America, she’s a bit wary of this conversation’s effectiveness if it remains only a conversation.

“You know how someone says, ‘Why’d you become a nurse or doctor?’ And they say, ‘I want to help people’?” asks Castillo. “Wouldn’t it be cool if someone says, ‘Why’d you become an engineer or a product designer?’ And you say, ‘I want to help people.’ ”

The info is here.