Turing AI Institute boss denies accusations of'toxic internal culture' The Alan Turing Institute Chair has told the BBC there is no substance to a number of serious accusations which rocked the organisation in the summer. In August, whistleblowers accused the charity's leadership of misusing public funds, overseeing a toxic internal culture, and failing to deliver on its mission. They said the Turing Institute, the UK's national body for artificial intelligence (AI), was on the brink of collapse after Peter Kyle, the then technology secretary, threatened to withdraw its £100m funding. But speaking exclusively to the BBC, Chair Dr Doug Gurr said the whistleblower claims were independently investigated by a third party which found them to have no substance. I fully sympathise that going through any transition is always challenging, he said.

In response to the resignation, a spokesperson from the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology said: "The technology secretary has been clear on the need for the institute to deliver value for money and maximum impact for taxpayers, and we will continue our work to support that ambition." Staff who wrote the whistleblowing complaint have told the BBC Dr Innes' resignation was the "first step". "With the rest of our 100m public funding still at stake, the priority now is to ensure the leadership overhaul that should follow - board and executive alike - can command the confidence of staff, government, regulators and, most importantly, the nation," they said. The Turing Institute said its board was now looking to appoint a new CEO who will oversee "the next phase" to "step up its work on defence, national security and sovereign capabilities". Its work had once focused on AI and data science research in environmental sustainability, health and national security, but moved on to other areas such as responsible AI.

On Tuesday 4th February 2025, the Children's AI Summit brought together around 150 children from across the UK to share their messages for global leaders, policymakers, and AI developers on what the future of AI should look like. Hosted by the Children and AI team in The Alan Turing Institute's Public Policy Programme and Queen Mary University of London, the event aimed to put children's voices and experiences centre stage by exploring how the technology impacts young people today, and how children can shape its future. As part of the summit, a Children's Manifesto for the Future of AI was developed. This incorporates ideas that were submitted in the run-up to the event, and was refined with the help of summit participants. The Turing's Children and AI team are attending the Paris AI Action Summit this week and will be taking the Children's Manifesto for the Future of AI with them, as well as screening a short film made at the Children's AI Summit.

An introduction to the essentials on transparent machine learning for learners of diverse backgrounds to understand and apply transparent machine learning in real-world applications with confidence and trust. Learners should have a knowledge of basic maths and Python for machine learning.

Hosted by The Alan Turing Institute, AI UK is a yearly event that brings together representatives from government, academia and industry to showcase data science and AI research and innovation in the UK. This year, the two-day conference featured talks, panel discussions, and hands-on workshops, and participants could attend in-person or remotely. One of the sessions focussed on an on-going case study in a London borough whereby the local council is using data and AI to help inform their decision making, and to improve what they do. Tariq set the scene by describing the borough of Camden, an area that not only houses institutions such as University College London and the Francis Crick Institute, and companies such as Google, but also some of the poorest communities in Europe. The council wants to tackle inequality and sees the use of data as one potential avenue.

When Sam Altman was sunsetting his first startup in early 2012, there was little indication that his path ahead would parallel that of Silicon Valley's then-wunderkind Mark Zuckerberg. While Altman was weighing his next moves after shutting down Loopt, his location-sharing startup, the Facebook CEO was at the forefront of social media's global takeover and leading his company to a blockbuster initial public offering that valued Zuckerberg's brainchild at $104 billion. But just over a decade later, the tables have dramatically turned. Nowadays, the promise of social media as a unifying force for good has all but collapsed, and Zuckerberg is slashing thousands of jobs after his company's rocky pivot to the metaverse. And it's Altman, a 37-year-old Stanford dropout, who's now seeing his star rise to dizzying heights -- and who faces the pitfalls of great power.

The Turing Institute is the UK's national institute for data science and artificial intelligence. On 23-24 March they held an event to showcase the very best AI academic content in the UK. Here, we give a flavour of the proceedings and highlight some of the interesting sessions and panel debates that took place on the first day. As the national institute for data science and artificial intelligence, The Turing Institute brings together people from a range of disciplines, and works with universities, centres of research excellence, industry and the public sector. The Institute has three main goals: 1) to advance world-class research and apply it to real-world problems, 2) to train the leaders of the future, 3) to lead the public conversation.

The AI Council has published a "roadmap" of advice for government in respect of developing a UK state strategy for artificial intelligence (AI). Eye-catchingly, it advocates what it calls "moonshots" that "could tackle fundamental challenges such as creating'explainable AI' and developing smart materials for energy storage". The council is a non-statutory body chaired by Tabitha Goldstaub, consisting of 20 people from academia and industry, including Wendy Hall, professor of computer science at the University of Southampton, Marc Warner, the CEO of AI consultancy firm Faculty, and Adrian Smith, chief executive of The Alan Turing Institute. The council was launched in 2018, on the back of the government's response to a House of Lords AI report that recommended the UK pick ethics as a realistic niche in the related fields of artificial intelligence and machine learning. It was bolstered in 2019 with recruits from online retailer Ocado and the Independent Commission on Freedom of Information.

The Alan Turing Institute is the UK's national institute for data science and artificial intelligence. The Institute is named in honour of the scientist Alan Turing and its mission is to make great leaps in data science and artificial intelligence research in order to change the world for the better. Machine learning (ML) is rapidly entering a diverse array of real-world applications including: medical treatment decision-making, financial modelling, and defence & security. Often, personal data is required in ML systems for two purposes – training, where especially in deep learning, the volumes required for effective systems can be vast, and for inference. As such, there is a strong requirement for the development of practical and provable ways to ensure the privacy of individuals when their data is used for such purposes.

The British Library on London's Euston Road is probably best known for its oldest items. The longest-surviving pieces among its 200 million-strong collection are Chinese oracle bones believed to date from about 1,500 BC. Other notable items in its ownership include one of Leonardo da Vinci's notebooks and, fittingly for the world's largest library, a copy of what it is recognised as the world's oldest mechanically printed book – the Gutenberg Bible. But for all its ties to the past, the library (pictured above) also houses a growing movement towards the future. Founded in 2015, The Alan Turing Institute is the UK's national research institution for data science and – since 2017 – artificial intelligence.