{"id":334532,"date":"2021-09-03T21:07:54","date_gmt":"2021-09-03T18:07:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/why-are-so-many-scummy-scammy-ai-companies-thriving\/"},"modified":"2021-09-03T21:07:54","modified_gmt":"2021-09-03T18:07:54","slug":"why-are-so-many-scummy-scammy-ai-companies-thriving","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/why-are-so-many-scummy-scammy-ai-companies-thriving\/","title":{"rendered":"#Why are so many scummy, scammy AI companies thriving?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"ez-toc-container\" class=\"ez-toc-v2_0_85 counter-hierarchy ez-toc-counter ez-toc-custom ez-toc-container-direction\">\n<p class=\"ez-toc-title\" style=\"cursor:inherit\">Table of Contents<\/p>\n<label for=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-item-6a3d28c7e30a1\" class=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-label\"><span class=\"\"><span class=\"eztoc-hide\" style=\"display:none;\">Toggle<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-icon-toggle-span\"><svg style=\"fill: #dd3333;color:#dd3333\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" class=\"list-377408\" width=\"20px\" height=\"20px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" fill=\"none\"><path d=\"M6 6H4v2h2V6zm14 0H8v2h12V6zM4 11h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2zM4 16h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2z\" fill=\"currentColor\"><\/path><\/svg><svg style=\"fill: #dd3333;color:#dd3333\" class=\"arrow-unsorted-368013\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"10px\" height=\"10px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" version=\"1.2\" baseProfile=\"tiny\"><path d=\"M18.2 9.3l-6.2-6.3-6.2 6.3c-.2.2-.3.4-.3.7s.1.5.3.7c.2.2.4.3.7.3h11c.3 0 .5-.1.7-.3.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7zM5.8 14.7l6.2 6.3 6.2-6.3c.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7c-.2-.2-.4-.3-.7-.3h-11c-.3 0-.5.1-.7.3-.2.2-.3.5-.3.7s.1.5.3.7z\"\/><\/svg><\/span><\/span><\/label><input type=\"checkbox\"  id=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-item-6a3d28c7e30a1\" checked aria-label=\"Toggle\" \/><nav><ul class='ez-toc-list ez-toc-list-level-1 ' ><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-1\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/why-are-so-many-scummy-scammy-ai-companies-thriving\/#Must_be_the_money\" >Must be the money<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-2\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/why-are-so-many-scummy-scammy-ai-companies-thriving\/#Human_in_the_loop\" >Human in the loop<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-3\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/why-are-so-many-scummy-scammy-ai-companies-thriving\/#The_Blue_Fairy\" >The Blue Fairy<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/nav><\/div>\n<p>&#8220;<strong>#Why are so many scummy, scammy AI companies thriving?<\/strong>&#8221;<br \/>\n<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/img-cdn.tnwcdn.com\/image?fit=796%2C417&amp;url=https%3A%2F%2Fcdn0.tnwcdn.com%2Fwp-content%2Fblogs.dir%2F1%2Ffiles%2F2021%2F09%2FscamAI.jpg&amp;signature=914f85154c386485a420ed34bdaadd08\" \/><\/p>\n<div><em>Did you know\u00a0Neural is taking the stage this fall? Together with an amazing line-up of experts, we will explore the future of AI during TNW Conference 2021.\u00a0Secure your online ticket now!<\/em><\/p>\n<p>After about the fifth or sixth time you read <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2020\/12\/29\/technology\/facial-recognition-misidentify-jail.html\">an article about a Black man being wrongfully arrested<\/a> due to faulty facial recognition AI, you start to wonder how nobody seems to be doing anything to stop this from h<a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/download-scripts-themes-apps\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"9\" title=\"Download Scripts &amp; Themes &amp; Apps\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">app<\/a>ening.<\/p>\n<p>Sure, whenever something goes wrong, the company behind the software is always <i>working to improve results<\/i><span> and the law enforcement agency using the software is always <\/span><i>reviewing procedures <\/i><span>to ensure this <\/span><i>doesn\u2019t happen again<\/i><span>. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>But it does. It seems like a day doesn\u2019t go by where a law enforcement agency isn\u2019t <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theregister.com\/2021\/08\/29\/in_brief_ai\/\">exposed for misusing facial recognition or predictive-policing systems<\/a>. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>And it\u2019s not just the government. Big business, small business, and everything in between are caught up in the <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cs.princeton.edu\/~arvindn\/talks\/MIT-STS-AI-snakeoil.pdf\">AI snake oil craze<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Hiring algorithms that judge human emotion, honesty, or sentiment are <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/hbr.org\/2019\/05\/all-the-ways-hiring-algorithms-can-introduce-bias\">inherently unethical and biased<\/a>. AI systems that allege to <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.newyorker.com\/tech\/annals-of-technology\/who-should-stop-unethical-ai\">predict human behavior before it happens<\/a> are almost always scams. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Yet hundreds \u2013 perhaps even thousands \u2013 of companies that specialize in BS AI are thriving. Why?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>The short answer: money. It\u2019s money. It\u2019s always money.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Must_be_the_money\"><\/span><span>Must be the money<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span>Most AI companies and organizations are in pursuit of useful <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/technology\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"4\" title=\"Technology\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">technology<\/a>. But the one\u2019s we\u2019re focused on in this article are those who know they\u2019re pushing snake oil and rely on hyperbole, \u201c<a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.fastcompany.com\/3062682\/science-explains-why-people-pass-the-buck-when-making-a-tough-decision\">human in the loop<\/a>\u201d BS, and fuzzy statistics to obscure what their products can do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>And this is mostly about startups, we\u2019ll get to big tech and academia\u2019s role in the crapshow that is the AI world in future articles.<\/p>\n<p>But, the reason companies use scammy hiring algorithms that clearly discriminate against Black applicants or the police don\u2019t mind using scheduling software that makes mathematically impossible claims about predicting crime is because <i>everyone involved in the entire process gets paid.<\/i><\/p>\n<p>Imagine you\u2019re a business person who\u2019s interested in AI and you come up with a really cool idea, we\u2019ll use predictive policing AI as an example:<\/p>\n<p><i>Wouldn\u2019t it be cool if we could predict where crime was going to happen?<\/i><\/p>\n<p>You\u2019re not an AI expert, but it seems like this <i>should<\/i> be possible using modern technology. After all, isn\u2019t there AI that can tell if someone\u2019s gay (no), determine if someone\u2019s a terrorist by looking at their face (<a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/innovations\/wp\/2016\/05\/24\/terrorist-or-pedophile-this-start-up-says-it-can-out-secrets-by-analyzing-faces\/\">hell no<\/a>), and AI that can fool humans into thinking the things it writes were written by humans (also, hell no)?<\/p>\n<p>Luckily for you, there are plenty of AI developers who definitely think they can create algorithms capable of predicting, based on historical data, where police-presence will be most needed in a given area. With enough data, you can predict anything right (<a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.technologyreview.com\/2020\/04\/02\/998478\/ai-machine-learning-social-outcome-prediction-study\/\">no<\/a>)?<\/p>\n<p>Now you just need funding. VC\u2019s will fund anything so long as there\u2019s a market for it, it\u2019s not explicitly illegal, and there\u2019s money to be made.<\/p>\n<p>Once the product is funded, developed, and packaged, it\u2019s up to the sales and marketing teams to figure out the rest.<\/p>\n<p>If you\u2019re the police officer responsible for purchasing new software for your department, and someone tells you they\u2019ve got research demonstrating their system is better at predicting crime than your current method, it sounds like you might be getting a good deal.<\/p>\n<p>At no point from inception to implementation is anyone involved obliged to wonder if it\u2019s ethical to use this software, because anyone who actually believes a machine can predict crime is in no position to opine on its ethical implementation and everyone else involved is in on the scam.<\/p>\n<p>Basically, the good apples believe systems such as hiring algorithms, predictive-policing, and facial recognition will take the human bias out of situations where it can be a problem, and the bad apples know it\u2019ll do the opposite, but they don\u2019t care so long as there\u2019s money to be made.<\/p>\n<p>The founders make money up front. The VCs get their\u2019s later, and the organizations implementing scammy AI can typically replace several useful systems and humans with a so-called all-in-one package \u2013 or, in the case of government orgs, they can justify budget increases with the AI\u2018s output.<\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Human_in_the_loop\"><\/span>Human in the loop<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>You\u2019d think there\u2019d be somebody somewhere with the power to say \u201cHey, I\u2019m versed in computer <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/sciencee\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"5\" title=\"Science\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">science<\/a> 101 and basic mathematics and your research papers are a joke. We shouldn\u2019t create\/sell\/purchase\/use this product.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But you\u2019d be wrong.<\/p>\n<p>CEOs often don\u2019t understand the finite details of their products. If your AI head says they can build a system to predict crime, who are you to tell them they\u2019re lying?<\/p>\n<p>Often the AI person isn\u2019t lying, they just have a myopic view of what \u201cpredicting crime\u201d means because they\u2019re in no position to understand the actual nature of crime \u2013 something criminology and sociology experts spend their entire lives studying.<\/p>\n<p>Your average tech startup doesn\u2019t tend to hire IT talent based on their sociology credits.<\/p>\n<p>And when it comes to sales teams, marketers, and purchasing agents: it\u2019s in everybody\u2019s best interest to believe the hype and nobody\u2019s qualified to dispute it.<\/p>\n<p>The average PR representative or HR manager is not going to read an AI startup\u2019s research papers and suddenly exclaim \u201chey, wait, these statistics were run against a survey with no ground truth. This math doesn\u2019t add up, we\u2019re being scammed!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Unfortunately the <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/social-mediaa\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"1\" title=\"Social Media\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">media<\/a> tends to make things worse. The sheer number of reporters who take press releases as gospel when reporting on these companies is staggering.<\/p>\n<p>Unfortunately, it\u2019s another case where many journalists don\u2019t know as much about the topic as the companies and developers they\u2019re interviewing and quoting.<\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"The_Blue_Fairy\"><\/span>The Blue Fairy<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>And, finally, the main reason why the BS AI ecosystem seems to thrive is because almost everybody wants to believe the products it produces are real.<\/p>\n<p>Everybody but criminals <i>wants<\/i> to believe an AI <i>could<\/i> predict crime. Everybody should <i>want<\/i> to believe that an AI hiring algorithm could solve the problem of bigoted hiring practices.<\/p>\n<p>A lot of people want to believe that facial recognition can accurately identify people, sentencing algorithms can be fair, and computer vision can determine if someone\u2019s gay, a terrorist, or being sincere.<\/p>\n<p>And there are a lot more marketing and PR agents in the world than there are journalists who know what they\u2019re talking about or AI experts willing to publicly call out BS when they see it.<\/p>\n<p>Until those things change, we\u2019ll continue to be treated to a never-ending <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/watch-movies-tv-seriess\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"8\" title=\"Watch Movies &amp; TV Series\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">series<\/a> of quiet reports demonstrating how flawed these AI systems are followed up by very loud articles detailing how the companies responsible are working diligently to \u201cimprove\u201d their systems.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<blockquote><p><strong><span style=\"color: #ff6600;\">If you liked the article, do not forget to share it with your friends. Follow us on\u00a0<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"><a style=\"color: #ff0000;\" href=\"https:\/\/news.google.com\/publications\/CAAqBwgKMLG0nwswvr63Aw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\">Google News<\/a><\/span>\u00a0too, click on the star and choose us from your favorites.<\/span><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">For forums sites go to <span style=\"color: #ff9900;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/forum.buradabiliyorum.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Forum.BuradaBiliyorum.Com<\/a><\/span><\/strong>\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>If you want to read more like this article, you can visit our <span style=\"color: #ff9900;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/technology\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Technology category.<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"color: black;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/thenextweb.com\/news\/why-are-scummy-scammy-ai-companies-thriving\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;#Why are so many scummy, scammy AI companies thriving?&#8221; Did you know\u00a0Neural is taking the stage this fall? Together with an amazing line-up of experts, we will explore the future of AI during TNW Conference 2021.\u00a0Secure your online ticket now! After about the fifth or sixth time you read an article about a Black man&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":334533,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/img-cdn.tnwcdn.com\/image\/neural?filter_last=1&fit=1280,640&url=https:\/\/cdn0.tnwcdn.com\/wp-content\/blogs.dir\/1\/files\/2021\/09\/scamAI.jpg&signature=b620d51b2702b47ed4acd51a1c263400","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-334532","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334532","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=334532"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334532\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/334533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=334532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=334532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=334532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}