Mr Viral
If being evil was fine to them, they’re proving it now
Feb 5, 20256:43 PM EST
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Google has reportedly dropped their pledge not to use artificial intelligence for weapons or surveillance, going against its slogan dating back to the early days, “Don’t be evil.” Ironically, Google replaced the phrase with “Do the right thing” when the tech giant reorganized Alphabet Inc. in 2015. “Don’t be evil” was quietly removed from the company’s code of conduct in 2018.
The move signifies that Google is no longer concerned with the potential criticism from taking government contracts to use AI for government surveillance and weapons contracts.
In 2018, the tech giant came under significant heat after it was revealed that Google had a contract with the U.S. Department of Defense using the name Project Maven. The project used Google’s Artificial Intelligence for drone imaging. Not long after, the company released a statement laying out its principles, including one pledge that promised not to use AI for technologies that “cause or are likely to cause overall harm,” weapons, surveillance, and “Technologies whose purpose contravenes widely accepted principles of international law and human rights.”
Google also had a blurb at the bottom of this section that reads, “We want to be clear that while we are not developing AI for use in weapons, we will continue our work with governments and the military in many other areas,” writes CEO Sundar Pichai. “These include cybersecurity, training, military recruitment, veterans’ healthcare, and search and rescue. These collaborations are important, and we’ll actively look for more ways to augment the critical work of these organizations and keep service members and civilians safe.”
This same blog post now has a message on the top of the page referencing the recent AI policy changes and urging users to read up on them in a separate post. The new post eliminates the previous section and has its current three principles outlined: Bold innovation, Responsible development and deployment, and Collaborative progress.
Source: Gizmodo
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