Yesterday, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee’s Subcommittee on Information Technology held a hearing titled, “Game Changers: Artificial Intelligence Part III, Artificial Intelligence and Public Policy.”  The purpose of this hearing was to hear from experts in the artificial intelligence (AI) space to examine the potential role for the government and private sector in addressing challenges posed by AI technology as well to consider the merits and costs of government solutions to some of these challenges.  Overall, the hearing was very insightful and many of the panelists expressed similar views to SIIA. While AI technology presents incredible potential, there are certain challenges that come along with its implementation.  These challenges, such as ethical considerations, global competitiveness, privacy, and the future of work, have been examined many times by stakeholders.  SIIA has also highlighted many areas in which the gove ...

Twenty years ago, Hal Varian and Carl Shapiro published what has become the classic introduction to network economics.  Called Information Rules it described and illustrated key economic concepts like network effects, positive feedback loops, standards wars, market tipping points and switching costs, using examples that are now so dated that would not be recognizable to today’s digital natives.  But the text drilled into a generation of entrepreneurs and policymakers the importance of understanding the basic economics of network industries before starting a network business or trying to throw a regulatory net around a network industry.   Today Hal Varian works as Google’s chief economist. In his personal capacity he delivered a crash course on AI and data to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s TecGlobal 2018 meeting on April 4. He illustrated the familiar advances in machine learning through pattern recognition in voice and images, noting that it was t ...

“One of the things that has struck me is how comfortable publishers are getting with data now,” said Russell Perkins, founder and president of InfoCommerce Group. “Media companies are pushing with different levels of intensity, seeing the potential of it. [Opening keynote speaker] Debra Walton said she is seeing that on a smaller scale now, data products becoming important to customers. ‘You’ve got to keep up with us.’ “Data publishers are getting much more sophisticated. It used to be predictive analytics, now the next big thing is prescriptive analytics. 'We’re going to tell you what to do.' Data products are becoming increasingly central to customers.” A hallmark of the Business Information & Media Summit (BIMS), which concluded yesterday in Fort Lauderdale, has been that it tells more about where the industry is going rather than where it has been. And BIMS 3.0 felt no different this week. The final morning wa ...

After honoring our veterans this past Veteran’s Day, it is also important to shed light on various ways to help ensure that Veterans and others with mental illnesses can receive the care that they may need for scars both visible and invisible.  Sadly, one of the most affected groups of suicide are veterans with an average of 20 Veterans passing away each day due to suicide, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs. As written in a previous SIIA AI Spotlight, in the United States, suicide is ranked as the third leading cause of death among people ages 10 to 14, second among people ages 15 to 24, fourth among people ages 35-54, and tenth overall according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.  One such tool that may aid in the field of suicide prevention is, unsurprisingly, artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning. Researchers from Carnegie Mellon University and Harvard University developed a machine learning algorithm that, when paired ...

On November 7, 2017 I made a short presentation to the AI Caucus event on AI and ethics, which is summarized in this blog.

SIIA has done many artificial intelligence (AI) spotlights this year where we have featured impressive, boundary-breaking technology in the space.  We have also released a handful of issue briefs, culminating in the most recent brief that we’ve released on Algorithms and Ethics.  What we have not done until this point, is feature how different countries and regions across the globe are prepared to handle AI, will benefit from AI, and how they plan to use AI in the future.  In an effort to compare these regions to each other, we will begin publishing the AI Landscape series as an accessory to the AI Spotlight series where we will do just these things.  We begin this series with a feature on China. China According to PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC), global GDP will receive a boost by $16 trillion by 2030 as a result of AI technology.  Nearly half of all that growth will come from China with AI increasing GDP in China by an estimated 1% each year.  C ...

One of the biggest cold cases of the 21st Century is the case of who betrayed Anne Frank and her family to the Nazis during World War II.  Anne Frank’s family and another family famously hid in a secret annex for two years before they were given away by an unknown person to the Gestapo.  The Nazis found them and they were sent to concentration camps.  Anne died in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp and famously wrote a diary documenting her experience hiding from the Nazis.  Her father Otto was the lone survivor of the group of eight hiders.  Otto was able to piece together much of what happened and had Anne’s diary published.  Yet, the Frank family, and many other families who suffered in the holocaust, thought they would never know who betrayed them.  Artificial Intelligence (AI) may be a tool that can help solve this mystery. This case, along with a few others, is strange for a number of reasons.  First, the Nazis were known f ...

Pam is walking around Shanghai and sees shops that contain shoes, handbags, clothes, and jewelry that are all emblazoned with the logos of famous designers.  Upon walking inside, she notices that many of these products, while not very cheap, are still markedly cheaper than if she were to buy the exact same product in the United States.  The quality looks and feels great, so without a second thought, she purchases a handbag.  After all, this isn’t a shady stand on a roadside.  This is a seemingly legitimate store.  It isn’t until she’s back in the United States that she discovers that the Louis Vuitton handbag that she bought is a fake. This type of situation is fairly common.  There are often only subtle differences between a real and fake product that may not be detectable at first touch or first look.  Other times, people are aware that what they’re purchasing is a counterfeit good and simply don’t care.  Regard ...

The application of big data analytics has already improved lives in innumerable ways.  It has improved the way teachers instruct students, doctors diagnose and treat patients, lenders find creditworthy customers, financial service companies control money laundering and terrorist financing, and governments deliver services.  It promises even more transformative benefits with self-driving cars and smart cities, and a host of other applications will drive fundamental improvements throughout society and the economy. Government policymakers have worked with developers and users of these advanced analytic techniques to promote and protect these publicly beneficial innovations, and they should continue to do so. In many circumstances, current law and regulation provide an adequate framework for strong public protection.  Most of the legal concerns that animate public discussions can be resolved through strong and vigorous enforcement of rules that apply to advanced and tradi ...

In the past two weeks, America has seen catastrophic devastation from both Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma.  As a result, thousands of Americans are struggling with all the damage incurred to their property. As homes and cars are still submerged in floodwaters, insurance companies have to find ways to quickly and effectively resolve insurance claims to provide fast relief.  To do this, some companies have been deploying predictive analytics and machine learning tools to respond to insurance claims – and there have been plenty.  Esurance is one such company.