Google finds itself in a military muddle as staff get restive
More than 3,000 have sent a letter to the search giant's boss protesting its work with the US Department of Defense amid increasingly heated debate over AI
First it was “don’t be evil”, then it was “do the right thing”.
It appears Google staff members aren’t too sure whether their employer is living up either of those much vaunted, but admirable, principles with its work for the US Department of Defense.
At issue is the latter's Project Maven. It is using the company’s open source artificial intelligence system TensorFlow to analyse footage captured by army surveillance drones and highlight what may be of interest for human review.
It's a pilot project sparked by the fact that there's too much footage for personnel to practicably scan, but one which has prompted more than 3,000 Googlers to take the time to sign a letter to boss Sundar Pichai stating that their company “should not be in the business of war” and requesting that the project be dropped.
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