Information Commissioner targets intrusive facial recognition

Facial recognition offers huge opportunities, but the Information Commissioner is more concerned about how it could impact privacy. In a post on the ICO blog, Information Commissioner Elizabeth Denham highlights the advantages and disadvantages of facial recognition. “I have identified FRT by law enforcement as a priority area for my office and I recently wrote to the Home Office and the NPCC setting out my concerns,” Denham wrote. “Should my concerns not be addressed, I will...

15 May 2018 | Government

White House will take a ‘hands-off’ approach to AI regulation

The White House has decided it will take a ‘hands-off’ approach to AI regulation despite many experts calling for safe and ethical standards to be set. Some of the world’s greatest minds have expressed concern about the development of AI without regulations — including the likes of Elon Musk, and the late Stephen Hawking. Musk famously said unregulated AI could post “the biggest risk we face as a civilisation”, while Hawking similarly warned “the development of full...

11 May 2018 | Ethics

Virtually Brainy: AI wires itself to navigate like mammals

Researchers have built an AI with virtual brain cells that wires itself to navigate an environment much like mammals do in nature. Fully understanding the ‘internal GPS’ used by humans and other mammals to navigate from point A to B has eluded neuroscientists for decades. By analysing a new AI, which developed ‘grid cells’ similar to our brains, researchers believe we could be closer than ever. The new AI was designed by a team from Google DeepMind and University College London to...

10 May 2018 | Machine Learning

Google launches cross-platform ML Kit APIs to simplify AI integration

Google is going all in on AI going by this year’s I/O conference, and it’s helping developers access some of these capabilities with its ML Kit set of APIs. ML Kit is a new suite of cross-platform APIs from Google enabling app developers to use machine learning for things such as face recognition, text scanning, reading barcodes, and even identifying objects and landmarks. From the ML Kit documentation page:

“We want the entire device experience to be...

9 May 2018 | Developers

Facebook trained its AI using 3.5 billion Instagram images

Facebook has a vast amount of data at its disposal for training AI algorithms, including billions of users' Instagram images. The social media giant acquired Instagram for $1 billion in 2012. At the time, some criticised its value with its 30 million users. Now, however, the platform has over 800 million active monthly users. Facebook trained a machine learning algorithm to categorise images by itself using over 3.5 billion posted on Instagram. The algorithm took into account the 17,000...

4 May 2018 | Machine Learning

Thousands of AI researchers are boycotting a science journal

Thousands of AI researchers are boycotting a popular science journal for a decision they believe is harmful to advancing developments. Science journal Nature recently announced it will be launching a dedicated section of its online publication to machine learning in January, 2019. That would normally be welcome, except the section is set to be put behind a paywall. Naturally, many AI researchers took umbrage at the plans. Much of the community are fierce advocates of open research — both to...

2 May 2018 | Machine Learning

Cardiac arrest-detecting AI will expand to further European cities

corti heart attack ai cardiac arrest health

A startup which is able to detect cardiac arrests using artificial intelligence has announced it will be expanding its service to further European cities later this year. Corti has partnered with the European Emergency Number Association (EENA) to expand its service to four additional cities. The startup, based in Copenhagen, will select which cities it will expand its pilot to next in June. The pilot in Copenhagen has been a resounding success measured by the analysis released today. Based...

25 April 2018 | Healthcare

Huawei wants to develop the first digital assistant with emotions

huawei ai digital assistant virtual artificial intelligence

Technology giant Huawei wants to develop the first digital assistant which evokes an emotional bond with the user to offer a more personal experience. "We want to introduce emotional interactions,” said Felix Zhang, VP of Software Engineering at Huawei, in an interview with CNBC. “We believe that in the future all of our end users will want to interact with the system more passionately.” If the movie ‘Her’ comes to mind when hearing about Huawei’s plans, executives said they were...

23 April 2018 | Bots

AI Expo: ‘The answer to AI in sport is prediction’

During a panel at the AI Tech Expo in London, we heard from several figures from professional football clubs who are using AI to get the edge over their competition both on and off the field. The panelists included Newcastle FC Sports Scientist John Fitzpatrick, Sport Lisboa e Benfica CIO Joao Copeto, and Sport Lisboa e Benfica Head of Analysis Nuno Maurício. Fitzpatrick has been with Newcastle United for around five years and has witnessed the increasing demand for IoT and AI technologies....

19 April 2018 | Healthcare

House of Lords: The UK can lead in AI by putting ethics first

uk house of lords ai ethics report

A report published today by the House of Lords reveals the current outlook for AI in the United Kingdom and suggests practical measures to secure its place as a global leader. While the world faces a shortage of AI talent, the UK’s leading universities produce candidates who are often snapped up quickly. Some of the biggest players in the space invest heavily in UK companies — most notable, perhaps, is Google’s £400 million acquisition of Cambridge-based DeepMind. The Lords’ report...

16 April 2018 | Ethics