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Google unveiled Monday a new initiative, called AI for Social Good, which aims to steer the vast resources and expertise of the company in artificial intelligence towards projects that have a positive impact on society. This initiative is a joint effort of Google.org, the philanthropic arm of the company, and Google engineers and researchers. The kickoff is given by the AI Impact challenge, which will distribute $ 25 million in grants, as well as access to Google resources aimed at non-profit organizations around the world.
"Artificial intelligence not only helps people create more useful products," said Monday Jeff Dean, head of AI at Google. "It also appears as a useful tool to improve the society in which we live."
The initiative comes as Google and other technology giants face tough ethical questions regarding the applications of their technologies. This year, for example, Google had to respond to internal and external criticism of its work to provide UAV technology to the Pentagon, as well as its cooperation with the Chinese government.
Dean told reporters that the new Amnesty International initiative for Social Good was not created to address employees' concerns about these projects. "This has been going on for some time," he said.
The goal of the initiative, however, is to help Google adhere to all of the ethical principles it has articulated as a result of the backlash it suffered in its contract with the Pentagon. The initiative, says Google, focuses on the very first goal set by Google: "to be socially beneficial".
"With AI, we have another tool for exploring and solving difficult and unanswered questions impacting society," Dean said.
Meanwhile, when Google puts forward its positive plans, it does not intend to give up potentially controversial contracts.
"We are very excited to be working with the US government and other governments in a way that is in keeping with our principles," Dean told reporters on Monday. how Google could continue to work with the Pentagon.
Google and Google.org have jointly designed the AI for Social Good initiative. So when Google chooses projects to support, they'll find the right Google engineers and researchers to integrate. Some engineers and researchers may end up working full time to support one of the "AI for Social Good" projects, while others may spend a day or two a week on this initiative.
The $ 25 million financial commitment is a water drop for Google, but it could have a disproportionate impact on the world of nonprofit organizations, in areas such as healthcare, healthcare, and healthcare. Agriculture, civil society or conservation of the environment.
Dean presented one of these projects: an augmented reality microscope that can help pathologists more easily spot cancer cells. The project has not yet lifted the regulatory hurdles to deploy in the United States. However, deployment in the US is not really the technology that could have the greatest impact, said ZDNet Bob MacDonald, Program Technical Manager of the AI team on health at Google Healthcare.
Given that about 70% of pathologists are based in the United States, Google could advance its "AI mission for social good" by finding deployment partners in under-served countries around the world. development, said MacDonald.
Jacquelline Fuller, president of Google.org, tells ZDNet that Google.org is trying to open all Open Source funded projects.
"We want to make sure these results, lessons learned, data, products and features created are available to everyone," she said. "We work with people in advance to ensure that the intellectual property created is permissive and open source, and from time to time a different intellectual property framework or approach may be warranted. but in general we want to make sure this is available to everyone. "
For example, Google.org worked with the anti-trafficking organization Thorn to develop AI tools to track online ads placed by human traffickers.
"The problem is that almost 200,000 new ads are uploaded each day to the US," Fuller explained. "There is far too much information to process manually."
Google gave $ 2.5 million to the company and gave it access to its resources. At present, the Spotlight Tool they developed is used in all 50 US states and Canada. He helped find more than 28,000 victims of human trafficking.
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