Corporate
Your face, Your choice?
Nov
“Life is the sum of our choices. Some we regret, some we’re proud of, some will haunt us forever. We are what we chose to be” Graham Brown.
Life is the sum of our choices. Some we regret, some we’re proud of, some will haunt us forever.
We are what we choose to be”
Graham Brown.
Facebook had developed a facial recognition tool that could scrape all the faces off the internet in about 2018. How the tool works is the faces that were scraped off the net can be run through an algorithm to identify who the faces belonged to. Once the face is identified the algorithm can then search to find everything about that individual. The photo could include anyone’s face, maybe it could be your face randomly snapped in a crowd.
Can you imagine the implications for example if you were a journalist having a meeting with a confidential source or having an interview at a coffee shop with a rival competitor or a secret lover. Some random stranger snapped a photo of their girlfriend having coffee and you were a part of the background. Your imagination is correct about the impact and possibilities of this technology.
Facebook made a choice. They chose not to release the tool as they realised this tool could have superpower possibilities and if was used by bad actors could be very dangerous to society. They thought in this instance beyond the profit of their company and the impact on global citizens.
Clearview AI on the other hand is a company that developed the same technology about the same time but initially stayed in the shadows. It had originally 30 million images of faces and currently is scraping hundreds of thousands of facial images each day. They chose to secretly sell the technology claiming a 98.6% facial recognition success rate to law enforcement in the USA and around the world. They chose another path, and the negative impacts are what Facebook feared.
There are now other companies that provide the same technology for a fee and countries are choosing it for various uses.
For example, in China, facial recognition was initially used for safety and security of its citizens. Over time once they had the infrastructure in place it became obvious the technology could be used for other curious purposes like:
- Ticketing J walkers automatically.
- Publicly shaming people for going out in their pyjamas.
- And to monitor use of toilet paper in public bathrooms to catch toilet paper thieves.
The concept of choice is something not only companies like Facebook and Clearview AI are making but governments and individuals.
Australia has made a choice to make Clearview AI technology illegal in Australia as it violates our privacy laws. America however has made the choice not to have such laws and 75 million facial images including Australians are being scraped from the internet every day.
Advertising companies are reinforcing the importance of individuals choice. This year the quote “life is the sum of our choices” was being used in an add on TV to sell some product.
It immediately caught my attention as it felt empowering and uplifting and catchy somehow. At the same time, it felt strangely disturbing. On reflection it was because it reinforced to me that it was all about individual choices, societies modern mantra rather than understanding, and valuing the impact that our choices have on others.
Although the quote infers a degree of personal responsibility which I admire, I believe life is an interplay of so many choices, it is not just about our own choices that need to be considered.
If we believe it is only about our choices in life and we don’t consider the consequences of those choices on others, I believe we lose a little more of our collective humanity and can have potentially dystopian consequences on all of us.
I accept it may be how we choose to react to other people’s choices, but it presumes that we know how we and others are going to react. In so many of life events we have no idea how we are going to react until we experience them for ourselves.
We have more challenges ahead not only with real data but synthetic data which is AI generated. This includes visual and auditory deep fakes so expertly generated that even your family cannot tell the difference between the real you and the generated you. This is particularly significant with the new releases of ChatGPT
What is encouraging is I am facilitating strategy meetings and are engaging in discussions with my executive coaching clients about the consequences of their choices. It is a topic gaining traction.
Some organisations are considering having a Consequence Executive which explores not only the use of technologies but the consequence of those technologies on the company, employees, and society.
The future is here. Let us as responsible humans within our own sphere of influence encourage the conversation further.
Let us aim to be proud of the choices we make rather than the ones we regret or believe will haunt future generations forever. In the end I expect Graham Brown is right we can choose who we want to be by what path we choose to take.
