Deepmind
Artificial intelligence, as we know, does not always work very well for people belonging to minorities. But the LGBT community is perhaps even more affected by this IT fairness issue. In any case, this is the opinion of four DeepMind researchers, who have just published a scientific article on this subject.
One of the main problems would be that data on LGBT people may be non-existent, because not recorded – a lack of « registration », which is not necessarily bad news …
However, in the health field, the authors explain, the research data used rarely includes LGBT indicators, either through negligence or out of privacy. An omission which, of course, does not allow us to create effective prediction models for these people.
The LGBT community can also suffer from bias induced by learning data. The risk is particularly present in recruitment. If the software used relies too much on historical data, it risks reproducing biased judgments of the past and disadvantages LGBT people.
This risk also exists for software related to language processing, such as speech recognition, translators or chatbots. Learning data can easily drag this software into abusive terms and stereotypes, while instead finding an inclusive way to deal with LGBT topics.
Finally, some states could use artificial intelligence to identify, discriminate or censor LGBT people within a population, much like the Chinese government does for the Uyghur population.
Indeed, there are still many countries where LGBT identities and culture are not accepted or even repressed. For all these reasons, the DeepMind researchers believe that a special research effort must be made to ensure that the artificial intelligence of tomorrow does not become a burden on this community. This research may also be useful for other minorities.
Diplomacy apologizes for refusing to employ homosexuals
According to AFP – British diplomacy issued a public apology on Monday July 5 for banning the recruitment of gay people until 1991, a « misguided » approach that deprived the UK of some of its « best talent. » Thirty years after the ban was lifted, in July 1991, Philip Barton, Permanent Undersecretary in the Foreign Office apologized. « I want to apologize publicly for this ban and the impact it has had on our LGBT staff and their loved ones, here in the UK and abroad »