by Tome Simonite, WIRED, September 3, 2019
https://www.wired.com/story/behind-rise-chinas-facial-recognition-giants/
Freedom House, a US-government-backed nonprofit, warned in a report last October that Chinese surveillance deals also export the country’s attitudes to privacy and could encourage companies and governments to collect and expose sensitive data. It argues that companies and products built to serve government agencies unconcerned about privacy are unlikely to become trustworthy defenders of human rights elsewhere, and can be forced to serve Chinese government interests.
Jeffrey Ding, who studies Chinese AI development at Oxford’s Future of Humanity Institute, says that on paper Megvii’s ethics structure appears stronger than that of some large US companies. Google and Microsoft have released statements of AI principles, but they are implemented only via internal review processes.
I mentioned Megvii and their facial recognition software earlier. I know that people in American are very concerned for their privacy, and I am sure the people in China are as well, so there would be a large amount of backlash from the implementation of something such as this right now. Although, the articles also states that Megvii’s policies on ethics appear to be stronger than that of established North American tech companies, so it comes down to the reputation that the tech has in the public eye.
