Beware of replicating sexism in AI, experts warn

Artificial intelligence could emulate human bias, including sexism, if there is no oversight on data used to create it, experts at the world's largest mobile phone fair in Barcelona warned Thursday. "We're all very aware the machines will learn the same bias as those who coded them," Emma McGuiguan, in charge of technology at consultants Accenture, said at the Mobile World Congress. AI is the science of programming machines or computers to reproduce human processes, like learning and decision making. Julie Woods-Moss, chief innovation officer at Indian mobile operator Tata Communications, said that in order to do this, a large amount of human-led data was needed. "We have to be very careful that we don't encourage AI to be biased," she said, calling on professionals in the sector to find ways to identify these biases.