UK AI strategy at risk unless diversity and data literacy taken seriously

The UK's newly launched national strategy will help keep the UK competitive as AI transforms businesses and jobs The power of AI to drive growth and innovation is clear, evidenced by the McKinsey Global Survey on AI that suggests that organisations are using AI as a tool for generating value, increasingly, in the form of revenues. But the black box approach taken by most AI companies comes with serious risks to scale bias like never before, intentional or not. As part of any AI strategy, diverse teams must be part of the process from the ground up to recognise biases in the data on which models are trained and to scenario plan how minorities may be impacted. Ensuring AI is explainable with a greater degree of transparency in training data, data gaps, and algorithmic logic can further reduce bias at scale. These are the key ways to mitigate this very real risk.