AI's'opportunity divide' could deepen global inequality, UN official warns Share AI's'opportunity divide' could deepen global inequality, UN official warns on social media Artificial intelligence (AI) risks widening the gap between rich and poor countries, potentially deepening existing social and economic inequalities, a senior United Nations official has warned. Developing countries face significant barriers to benefitting from the AI revolution, Tomas Lamanauskas, the deputy secretary-general of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), a UN agency focused on information and communication technologies, told Al Jazeera. "AI has the huge potential of powering health, education, public services, industries, agriculture, trade. So a great divide could really mean an opportunity divide, and really could deepen the socioeconomic divide," he said. Lamanauskas said the disparities are already evident in digital infrastructure, citing the examples of Africa and Latin America, which together account for just 3.3 percent of global data centre capacity.