Google is investigating the actions of another top AI ethicist • Hacker News Board

Re: Google is investigating the actions of another top AI ethicist

#21

Post by KirillPanov » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 7:50 AM UTC

willxinc wrote: post #13

KirillPanov wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or instead of answering my question people could just downvote me. I guess. Legitimately curious here. "Download all my mail from the mail server" is something I do multiple times every day. I guess my workflow would be verboten in corporate environments? Is it really such an odd behavior that they have an automated check for this, and it isn't throwing false positives every hour? Or is this one of those things they…

Typically this is disallowed from non company devices. If you're allowed to sync your corporate email to your personal devices, that's probably an oversight.

So if IMAP-sync to corporate-owned laptops is a common and allowed use case how did an automated system notice this activity?

It's not like the IMAP protocol sends the host MAC address or /etc/machine-id as part of the command stream.

I'm really having a hard time imagining a plausible automated security system that would have led to this outcome.

Re: Google is investigating the actions of another top AI ethicist

#22

Post by yholio » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 7:50 AM UTC

esja wrote: post #8

“In this instance, yesterday our systems detected that an account had exfiltrated thousands of files and shared them with multiple external accounts.” If true, that is damning, and would demonstrate once again that being an “ethics researcher” does not mean that you are are any more ethical than the average person. It just means you are more interested in the subject. As a side note, I wish this field was more intere…

Leaking sensitive material is not unethical by definition, some situations might impose a moral imperative to act in this manner.

In the narrow ethical world of top down organizations, be they for profit corporations or the Army, it's of course a mortal sin, as is every other attempt to bring accountability to upper levels and redirect the flow of bullshit from top-down to bottom-up. I'll let you guess who decides what "ethics" stands for in this situation.

Re: Google is investigating the actions of another top AI ethicist

#23

Post by jakelazaroff » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 7:51 AM UTC

izacus wrote: post #17

Zarath wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if Google is doing something unethical?

Well, it'd be great to hear this from a respectable and ethical person and not someone who'll lie for their own gain, right?

Because Google has a stellar ethical track record and would never lie for their own gain, right? I think they’ve exhausted the benefit of the doubt.

Re: Google is investigating the actions of another top AI ethicist

#24

Post by ranjitcool1 » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 7:52 AM UTC

yholio wrote: post #22

esja wrote: post #8

“In this instance, yesterday our systems detected that an account had exfiltrated thousands of files and shared them with multiple external accounts.” If true, that is damning, and would demonstrate once again that being an “ethics researcher” does not mean that you are are any more ethical than the average person. It just means you are more interested in the subject. As a side note, I wish this field was more intere…

Leaking sensitive material is not unethical by definition, some situations might impose a moral imperative to act in this manner. In the narrow ethical world of top down organizations, be they for profit corporations or the Army, it's of course a mortal sin, as is every other attempt to bring accountability to upper levels and redirect the flow of bullshit from top-down to bottom-up. I'll let you guess who decides wh…

That is such a subjective statement. One persons morals differ from another’s - a leak is a leak doesn’t matter what excuses one makes to justify it

Re: Google is investigating the actions of another top AI ethicist

#25

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 7:52 AM UTC

esja wrote: post #8

“In this instance, yesterday our systems detected that an account had exfiltrated thousands of files and shared them with multiple external accounts.” If true, that is damning, and would demonstrate once again that being an “ethics researcher” does not mean that you are are any more ethical than the average person. It just means you are more interested in the subject. As a side note, I wish this field was more intere…

[deleted]

Re: Google is investigating the actions of another top AI ethicist

#26

Post by ranjitcool1 » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 7:55 AM UTC

Just get rid of this meaningless ethical department. Have lawyers worry about ethics, Google focus on your business and continue to grow it. People think companies are democracies - just quit the job instead of feeling the need to change the company because that will just not happen and you will have unnecessary stress

Re: Google is investigating the actions of another top AI ethicist

#27

Post by SpicyLemonZest » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 7:57 AM UTC

meheleventyone wrote: post #15

esja wrote: post #8

“In this instance, yesterday our systems detected that an account had exfiltrated thousands of files and shared them with multiple external accounts.” If true, that is damning, and would demonstrate once again that being an “ethics researcher” does not mean that you are are any more ethical than the average person. It just means you are more interested in the subject. As a side note, I wish this field was more intere…

It’s not necessarily unethical to do that if you believe you are uncovering or preventing the cover up of unethical behaviour. Ethics is more than following the rules. See whistleblower protections for where that sort of thing intersects with the law.

I just don’t see much reason to believe that she has the kind of evidence that would justify calling her a whistleblower. I could be wrong, and if she releases emails of Sundar being racist or something I’ll be the first to admit I was wrong, but it seems a lot more like she was just angry over the Gebru firing.

Re: Google is investigating the actions of another top AI ethicist

#28

Post by Barrin92 » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 7:59 AM UTC

esja wrote: post #8

“In this instance, yesterday our systems detected that an account had exfiltrated thousands of files and shared them with multiple external accounts.” If true, that is damning, and would demonstrate once again that being an “ethics researcher” does not mean that you are are any more ethical than the average person. It just means you are more interested in the subject. As a side note, I wish this field was more intere…

>If true, that is damning

it's not damning and not unethical, it's the definition of whistle-blowing.

Re: Google is investigating the actions of another top AI ethicist

#29

Post by cauthon » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 8:01 AM UTC

ALittleLight wrote: post #3

I was disappointed to find out that AI ethicists at Google aren't LessWrong style AI ethicists. I've just read one Google AI ethics paper in it's entirety but it seemed pretty non-insightful and not actionable. That said, if Google is "investigating" her because she was trying to find evidence of discrimination or bad treatment of Dr. Gebru, that seems borderline criminal behavior. (Assuming her attempts at trying to…

> I was disappointed to find out that AI ethicists at Google aren't LessWrong style AI ethicists. I've just read one Google AI ethics paper in it's entirety but it seemed pretty non-insightful and not actionable.

This seems like a contradictory criticism to make. The Less Wrong folk, in my perception, mostly dabble in thought experiments (such as Roko’s basilisk) that aren’t terribly relevant to real world AI work. Timnit’s work on identifying racial and gendered inaccuracies in facial recognition [1] seems much more actionable.

[1] https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/06/12/1003482/amazon-s...

Re: Google is investigating the actions of another top AI ethicist

#30

Post by SpicyLemonZest » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 8:02 AM UTC

jakelazaroff wrote: post #23

izacus wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, it'd be great to hear this from a respectable and ethical person and not someone who'll lie for their own gain, right?

Because Google has a stellar ethical track record and would never lie for their own gain, right? I think they’ve exhausted the benefit of the doubt.

The benefit of what doubt? No matter how much you distrust Google, we can’t really presume they’re guilty of hypothetical accusations that haven’t actually been made.