Meta forced to change its advertisement algorithm to address algorithmic discrimination

In his New York Times article, Mike Isaac describes how Meta is implementing a new system to automatically check whether the housing, employment and credit ads it hosts are shown to people equally. This is a move following a 111,054 US dollar fine the US Justice Department has issued Meta because its ad systems have been shown to discriminate its users by, amongst other things, excluding black people from seeing certain housing ads in predominately white neighbourhoods. This is the outcome of a long process, which we have written about previously.

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Exploited and silenced: Meta’s Black whistleblower in Nairobi

In 2019, a Facebook content moderator in Nairobi, Daniel Motaung, who was paid USD 2.20 per hour, was fired. He was working for one of Meta’s largest outsourcing partners in Africa, Sama, which brands itself as an “ethical AI” outsourcing company, and is headquartered in California. Motaung led a unionisation attempt with more than 100 colleagues, fighting for better wages and working conditions.

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‘Race-blind’ content moderation disadvantages Black users

Over the past months a slew of leaks from the Facebook whistleblower, Frances Haugen, has exposed how the company was aware of the disparate and harmful impact of its content moderation practices. Most damning is that in the majority of instances, Facebook failed to address these harms. In this Washington Post piece, one of the latest of such revelations is discussed in detail: Even though Facebook knew it would come at the expense of Black users, its algorithm to detect and remove hate speech was programmed to be ‘race-blind’.

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Opinion: Biden must act to get racism out of automated decision-making

Despite Biden’s announced commitment to advancing racial justice, not a single appointee to the task force has focused experience on civil rights and liberties in the development and use of AI. That has to change. Artificial intelligence, invisible but pervasive, affects vast swaths of American society and will affect many more. Biden must ensure that racial equity is prioritized in AI development.

By ReNika Moore for Washington Post on August 9, 2021

Racist Technology in Action: Facebook labels black men as ‘primates’

In the reckoning of the Black Lives Matter movement in summer 2020, a video that featured black men in altercation with the police and white civilians was posted by the Daily Mail, a British tabloid. In the New York Times, Ryan Mac reports how Facebook users who watched that video, saw an automated prompt that asked if they would like to “keep seeing videos about Primates,” despite there being no relatedness to primates or monkeys.

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Hera Hussain: ‘Decolonising digital rights’

For as long as I can remember, I’ve felt the duty of being that woman who sits in a meeting room in London, Geneva, New York, Berlin and Paris and talks about what digital rights mean for not just people of colour in Europe and North America, but across the rest of the world. Approximately 84% of the world’s poor live in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, and the digital divide remains steep but that’s only part of the story. These aren’t passive consumers of the web. They’re active prosumers. TikTok has been downloaded over 360 million times in South East Asia, a region of 658 million people. With social platforms, anyone with a phone can become a star, make money, connect with others, build a family of choice and acceptance, fall in love, and live a life they may not be allowed otherwise.

By Hera Hussain for Who Writes The Rules on August 23, 2021

Big Tech is propped up by a globally exploited workforce

Behind the promise of automation, advances of machine learning and AI, often paraded by tech companies like Amazon, Google, Facebook and Tesla, lies a deeply exploitative industry of cheap, human labour. In an excerpt published on Rest of the World from his forthcoming book, “Work Without the Worker: Labour in the Age of Platform Capitalism,” Phil Jones illustrates how the hidden labour of automation is outsourced to marginalised, racialised and disenfranchised populations within the Global North, as well as in the Global South.

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We leven helaas nog steeds in een ­wereld waarin huidskleur een probleem is

Papa, mag ik die huidskleur?’ Verbaasd keek ik op van de kleurplaat die ik aan het inkleuren was, om mijn dochter te zien wijzen naar een stift met een perzikachtige kleur. Of misschien had die meer de kleur van een abrikoos. Afijn, de stift had in ieder geval niet háár huidskleur. Mijn dochter mag dan wel twee tinten lichter van kleur zijn dan ik, toch is zij overduidelijk bruin.

By Ilyaz Nasrulla for Trouw on September 23, 2021

Can Outside Pressure Change Silicon Valley?

How has activism evolved in our digital society? In this episode of Sudhir Breaks the Internet, Sudhir talks to Jade Magnus Ogunnaike about the intersection of big tech and civil rights. She is a senior campaign director for Color of Change. It’s a racial justice organization that blends traditional organizing efforts with an updated playbook for how to make change.

By Jade Magnus Ogunnaike and Sudhir Venkatesh for Freakonomics on May 17, 2021

Facebook —het grootste land ter wereld— is gemaakt om te profileren (ook etnisch)

Typhoon werd als zwarte rapper in een mooie auto aangehouden. Sindsdien is de discussie over etnisch profileren terecht losgebarsten. Er is daarbij zelden aandacht voor het feit dat de businessmodellen van diensten uit Silicon Valley grotendeels zijn gebaseerd op profilering, en dat etnisch profileren daarbij als innovatief marketinginstrument wordt aangeprezen.

By Hans de Zwart for Bits of Freedom on June 23, 2016

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