{"id":283960,"date":"2021-06-25T19:07:26","date_gmt":"2021-06-25T16:07:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/googles-algorithm-misidentified-an-engineer-as-a-serial-killer\/"},"modified":"2021-06-25T19:07:26","modified_gmt":"2021-06-25T16:07:26","slug":"googles-algorithm-misidentified-an-engineer-as-a-serial-killer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/googles-algorithm-misidentified-an-engineer-as-a-serial-killer\/","title":{"rendered":"#Google’s algorithm misidentified an engineer as a serial killer"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Google’s algorithm misidentified an engineer as a serial killer<\/strong>”
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Google\u2019s algorithmic failures can dreadful consequences, from directing racist search terms to the White House<\/a> in Google Maps to labeling Black people as gorillas<\/a> in Google Photos.<\/p>\n

This week, the Silicon Valley giant added another algorithmic screw-up to the list: misidentifying a software engineer as a serial killer.<\/p>\n

The victim of this latest botch was Hristo Georgiev, an engineer based in Switzerland. Georgiev discovered that a Google search of his name returned a photo of him linked to a Wikipedia entry on a notorious murderer.<\/p>\n

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Seems like Google falsely associated a photo of mine with a Wikipedia article of a serial killer. I don’t know if this is hilarious or terrifying. pic.twitter.com\/rmAL7uQYy4<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Hristo Georgiev (@hggeorgievcom) June 24, 2021<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cMy first reaction was that somebody was trying to pull off some sort of an elaborate prank on me, but after opening the Wikipedia article itself, it turned out that there\u2019s no photo of me there whatsoever,\u201d said\u00a0Georgiev in a blog post<\/a>.<\/p>\n

[Read:\u00a0Why entrepreneurship in emerging markets matters<\/span><\/span>]<\/em><\/p>\n

Georgiev believes the error was caused by Google\u2018s knowledge graph, which generates infoboxes next to search results.<\/p>\n

He suspects the algorithm matched his picture to the Wikipedia entry because the now-dead killer shared his name.<\/p>\n

Georgiev is far from the first victim of the knowledge graph misfiring. The algorithm has previously generated infoboxes that falsely registered actor Paul Campbell as deceased<\/a>\u00a0and listed the California Republican Party\u2019s ideology as \u201cNazism\u201d<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In Georgiev\u2019s case, the issue was swiftly resolved. After reporting the bug to Google, the company removed his image from the killer\u2019s infobox. Georgiev gave credit to the HackerNews community<\/a> for accelerating the response.<\/p>\n

Other victims, however, may not be so lucky. If they never find the error \u2014 or struggle to resolve it \u2014 the misinformation could have troubling consequences.<\/p>\n

I certainly wouldn\u2019t want a potential employer, client, or partner to see my face next to an article about a serial killer.<\/p>\n

Greetings Humanoids! Did you know we have a news<\/a>letter all about AI? You can subscribe to it\u00a0right here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n