The Human Toll of Protecting the Internet from the Worst of Humanity
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Re: The Human Toll of Protecting the Internet from the Worst of Humanity
#2Are there any projects working to automate the identification of offensive material with Machine Vision or Machine Learning? Replacing these peoples' jobs with computers might actually be a humane act.
Re: The Human Toll of Protecting the Internet from the Worst of Humanity
#3Are there any projects working to automate the identification of offensive material with Machine Vision or Machine Learning? Replacing these peoples' jobs with computers might actually be a humane act.
As the article states, "Although algorithms and artificial intelligence have helped streamline the process of moderation, most technology companies that host user-generated content employ moderators like Soto to screen video, text, and images, to see if they violate company guidelines."
So the algorithms are used to create the list of dubious material. But in the end you need a human being to look at the picture/video and call the police as needed.
The day that AI can do that for us, they will do any other job also.
Re: The Human Toll of Protecting the Internet from the Worst of Humanity
#4> constant exposure to the worst of humanity on a daily basis takes an undeniable toll.
This is one of the troubles police officers find in their daily work. When they are not part of the society where they work it is hard for them to empathize, as they just see the worst parts of that society.
In the police case also to have members of the police that are part of the communities they serve. But counseling also is needed to be able to deal with a biased view of reality. People don't call the police to show them how nice a neighbor is, or to invite them to a party. Their experience is, like for the guy in the article, to see only the bad parts as the good ones are filtered away.
Re: The Human Toll of Protecting the Internet from the Worst of Humanity
#5Dare I guess that these people generally get paid minimum wage?
> Tech companies don’t like to talk about the details of content moderation, so it’s difficult to judge how well they’re caring for the psychological health of moderators.
The number of such stories which include said companies declining comment (not this one, but anecdotally that's how it seems to be) is kind of a red flag though.
Re: The Human Toll of Protecting the Internet from the Worst of Humanity
#6Are there any projects working to automate the identification of offensive material with Machine Vision or Machine Learning? Replacing these peoples' jobs with computers might actually be a humane act.
I really wish there was.
I did forensics for a couple years, working with the police force to access and/or recover incriminating evidence.
I really, really wish that a machine could replace a person in that circumstance. And to a certain extent, it is possible.
One of the really unfortunate parts of the process, is to know a video is incriminating, someone at some point has to see that video.
It was part of my job to analyse and catalogue the evidence I recovered, such as saying who was in a video, and what happened to who inside it.
ML will hopefully take over this at some point, but it is difficult for a computer, at this stage, to tell if say, penetration, is involved.
It's moving in that direction, and that is absolutely fantastic.
No person should be required to witness this crap. Hopefully, we can offload it to something that can, one day, be better than us at it.
Re: The Human Toll of Protecting the Internet from the Worst of Humanity
#7> constant exposure to the worst of humanity on a daily basis takes an undeniable toll. This is one of the troubles police officers find in their daily work. When they are not part of the society where they work it is hard for them to empathize, as they just see the worst parts of that society. In the police case also to have members of the police that are part of the communities they serve. But counseling also is ne…
I would dare say nothing of worth being done stop child abuse anywhere in world would compounds the effect of being exposed.
Re: The Human Toll of Protecting the Internet from the Worst of Humanity
#8Are there any projects working to automate the identification of offensive material with Machine Vision or Machine Learning? Replacing these peoples' jobs with computers might actually be a humane act.
There's this by Yahoo:
Re: The Human Toll of Protecting the Internet from the Worst of Humanity
#9Are there any projects working to automate the identification of offensive material with Machine Vision or Machine Learning? Replacing these peoples' jobs with computers might actually be a humane act.
I really wish there was. I did forensics for a couple years, working with the police force to access and/or recover incriminating evidence. I really, really wish that a machine could replace a person in that circumstance. And to a certain extent, it is possible. One of the really unfortunate parts of the process, is to know a video is incriminating, someone at some point has to see that video. It was part of my job t…
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Re: The Human Toll of Protecting the Internet from the Worst of Humanity
#10Are there any projects working to automate the identification of offensive material with Machine Vision or Machine Learning? Replacing these peoples' jobs with computers might actually be a humane act.
Yes, there are a lot. For example, NCMEC maintains databases of child porn hashes using photodna and other things.
Machine learning and other algorithms are used to identify images that end up in this database (and others).
Sadly, teaching machines what exploitation looks like is hard and it's not as simple as "identify things that have explicit sexual activity" and then "filter those things by people who appear to be 6 years old".
People still often have to make a final determination because categorization is ... hard
(and honestly, nobody wants to be the guy handling mislabeling, etc)