Professional Responsibility (50)
Find narratives by ethical themes or by technologies.
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- 41 min
- The New York Times
- 2021
In this podcast episode, Ellen Pao, an early whistleblower on gender bias and racial discrimination in the tech industy, tells the story of her experience suing the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins for gender discrimination. The episode then moves into a discussion of how Silicon Valley, and the tech industry more broadly, is dominated by white men who do not try to deeply understand or move toward racial or gender equity; instead, they focus on PR moves. Specifically, she reveals that social media companies and CEOs can be particularly performative when it comes to addressing racial or gender inequality, focusing on case studies rather than breeding a new, more fair culture.
- The New York Times
- 2021
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- 41 min
- The New York Times
- 2021
Sexism and Racism in Silicon Valley
In this podcast episode, Ellen Pao, an early whistleblower on gender bias and racial discrimination in the tech industy, tells the story of her experience suing the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins for gender discrimination. The episode then moves into a discussion of how Silicon Valley, and the tech industry more broadly, is dominated by white men who do not try to deeply understand or move toward racial or gender equity; instead, they focus on PR moves. Specifically, she reveals that social media companies and CEOs can be particularly performative when it comes to addressing racial or gender inequality, focusing on case studies rather than breeding a new, more fair culture.
How did Silicon Valley and the technology industry come to be dominated by white men? How can this be addressed, and how can the culture change? How can social networks in particular be re-imagined to open up doors to more diverse leadership and workplace cultures?
Sway: Silicon Valley's Thin Skins and Giant Egos-
- 5 min
- Wired
- 2021
This narrative describes the recent AI Incident Database launched at the end of 2020, where companies report case studies in which applied machine learning algorithms did not function as intended or caused real-world harm. The goal is to operate in a sense similar to air travel safety report programs; with this database, technological developers can get a sense of how to make algorithms which are more safe and fair while having the incentive to take precautions to stay off the list.
- Wired
- 2021
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- 5 min
- Wired
- 2021
Don’t End Up on This Artificial Intelligence Hall of Shame
This narrative describes the recent AI Incident Database launched at the end of 2020, where companies report case studies in which applied machine learning algorithms did not function as intended or caused real-world harm. The goal is to operate in a sense similar to air travel safety report programs; with this database, technological developers can get a sense of how to make algorithms which are more safe and fair while having the incentive to take precautions to stay off the list.
What is your opinion on this method of accountability? Is there anything it does not take into account? Is it possible that some machine learning algorithms make mistakes that cannot even be detected by humans? How can this be avoided? How can the inner workings of machine learning algorithms be made more understandable and digestible by the general public?
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- 7 min
- Wired
- 2020
As different levels of the U.S government have introduced and passed bills regulating or banning the use of facial recognition technologies, tech monopolies such as Amazon and IBM have become important lobbying agents in these conversations. It seems that most larger groups are on different pages in terms of how exactly face recognition algorithms should be limited or used, especially given their negative impacts on privacy when used for surveillance.
- Wired
- 2020
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- 7 min
- Wired
- 2020
Congress Is Eyeing Face Recognition, and Companies Want a Say
As different levels of the U.S government have introduced and passed bills regulating or banning the use of facial recognition technologies, tech monopolies such as Amazon and IBM have become important lobbying agents in these conversations. It seems that most larger groups are on different pages in terms of how exactly face recognition algorithms should be limited or used, especially given their negative impacts on privacy when used for surveillance.
Can and should the private sector be regulated in its use of facial recognition technologies? How is it that tech monopolies might hold so much sway with government officials, and how can this be addressed? Do the benefits of facial recognition, such as convenience at the airport, listed at the end of the article make enough of a case against a complete ban of the technology, or do the bad applications ultimately outweigh the good ones? What would the ideal bill look like in terms of limiting or banning facial recognition?
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- 5 min
- Tech Crunch
- 2020
During Google’s attempt to merge with the company Fitbit, the NGO Amnesty International has provided warnings to the competition regulators in the EU that such a move would be detrimental to privacy. Based on Google’s historical malpractice with user data, since its status as a tech monopoly allows it to mine data from several different avenues of a user’s life, adding wearable health-based tech to this equation puts the privacy and rights of users at risk. Calls for scrunity of “surveillance capitalism” employed by tech giants.
- Tech Crunch
- 2020
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- 5 min
- Tech Crunch
- 2020
No Google-Fitbit merger without human rights remedies, says Amnesty to EU
During Google’s attempt to merge with the company Fitbit, the NGO Amnesty International has provided warnings to the competition regulators in the EU that such a move would be detrimental to privacy. Based on Google’s historical malpractice with user data, since its status as a tech monopoly allows it to mine data from several different avenues of a user’s life, adding wearable health-based tech to this equation puts the privacy and rights of users at risk. Calls for scrunity of “surveillance capitalism” employed by tech giants.
When considering how companies and advertisers may use them, what sorts of personal statistics related to health and well-being should and should not be collected by mobile computing devices? How can devices originally built to stand on their own as one technological artifact become more convenient or harmful to a user when they become part of a technological architecture?
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- 3 min
- TechCrunch
- 2020
This short article details a pledge inspired by the practices of the French government for tech monopolies to be more responsible in the areas of taxes and privacy. As of 2020, many have signed onto this initiative.
- TechCrunch
- 2020
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- 3 min
- TechCrunch
- 2020
Dozens of tech companies sign ‘Tech for Good Call’ following French initiative
This short article details a pledge inspired by the practices of the French government for tech monopolies to be more responsible in the areas of taxes and privacy. As of 2020, many have signed onto this initiative.
What does accountability for tech monopolies look like? Who should offer robust challenges to these companies, and who actually has the power to do so?
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- 5 min
- ABC News
- 2020
The United States government is pushing its interest in breaking up the tech monopoly that is Facebook, hoping to restore some competition in the social networking and data selling market which the company dominates. Facebook, of course, is resistant to these efforts.
- ABC News
- 2020
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- 5 min
- ABC News
- 2020
Facebook hit with antitrust lawsuit from FTC and 48 state attorneys general
The United States government is pushing its interest in breaking up the tech monopoly that is Facebook, hoping to restore some competition in the social networking and data selling market which the company dominates. Facebook, of course, is resistant to these efforts.
What role did data collection and use play in Facebook’s rise as a monopoly power? What would breaking up this monopoly accomplish? Will users achieve more data privacy if one large company does not own several platforms on which users communicate?