A.I. has a bias problem that needs to be fixed: World Economic Forum

Artificial intelligence has a bias problem and the way to fix it is by making the tech industry in the West "much more diverse", according to the head of AI and machine learning at the World Economic Forum. Just two to three years ago, there were very few people raising ethical questions around the use of AI, Kay Firth-Butterfield told CNBC at the World Economic Forum's Annual Meeting of the New Champions in Tianjin, China. But ethical questions have now "come to the fore," she said. "That's partly because we have (the General Data Protection Regulation), obviously, in Europe, thinking about privacy, and also because there have been some obvious problems with some of the AI algorithms." Theoretically, machines are supposed to be unbiased.