Facebook says it will look for racial bias in its algorithms

Venus might be teeming with dozens of volcanoes that were recently active

Sponsored by Insight The Download Your daily dose of what’s up in emerging technology 07.22.20 Good morning! Today: Facebook will hunt for racial bias in its algorithms, and Venus might be teeming with volcanoes. Get your friends to sign up here to get The Download every day. Facebook says it will look for racial bias in its algorithms   The news: Facebook says it is setting up new internal teams to look for racial bias in the algorithms that drive its main social network and Instagram, reports the Wall Street Journal. In particular, the investigations will address the adverse effects of machine learning—which can encode implicit racism in training data—on Black, Hispanic and other minority groups. Why it matters: The last few years have seen increasing numbers of researchers and activists highlight the problem of bias in AI and the disproportionate impact it has on minorities. Facebook, which uses machine learning to curate the daily experience of its 2.5 billion users, is well overdue an internal assessment of this kind. There is already evidence that Facebook’s ad-serving algorithms discriminate by race. Under pressure: Facebook has a history of dodging accusations of bias in its systems. It has taken several years of bad press and pressure from civil rights groups to get to this point. The move is welcome. But it should be part of a wider overhaul that also grapples with policies that give platforms to racist politicians, white-supremacist groups and Holocaust deniers. Read the full story. — Will Douglas Heaven Venus might be teeming with dozens of volcanoes that were recently active Scientists have identified 37 volcanic structures on Venus that may still be active today. The results upend long-held assumptions that the second planet from the sun is largely dormant.  What we thought: Unlike Earth, Venus doesn’t have plate tectonics that are constantly moving and gradually shaping its surface, leaving many scientists to assume the planet had been inactive for perhaps the last half-billion years. But this assumption has never been truly tested. The new findings: They are focused around ring-like structures called coronae, upwells of volcanic material from the planet’s interior, which are a sign of geological activity. The researchers developed simulations of what the planet’s active coronae should look like based on thermal data. The researchers then looked for these characteristics in infrared images of Venus’s topography. Altogether, they identified and mapped 133 corona-like structures, 37 of which were likely large volcanic hot spots that have erupted within the last couple of million years or so (that’s very recent in geological time scales). Read the full story. —Neel V. Patel We can still have nice things A place for comfort, fun and distraction in these weird times. (Got any ideas? Drop me a line or tweet 'em at me.)   + Swedish artist Andreas Wannerstedt produces weirdly mesmerizing and satisfying motion graphics.   + A website dedicated solely to news about potatoes.   + It can be hard, being a bird.   + Travel with your ears with these podcasts.   + How to cook a perfect roast chicken.   + The incredible creatures of the night sea. Sponsor Message 2020 Insight Intelligent Technology Pulse: The impact of covid-19 on business readiness Insight surveyed 200 IT professionals to find out how prepared they were to take on the covid-19 impacts on budgets, priorities, and new responsibilities. In a series of multiple-choice and open-ended questions, Insight gathered a candid view of the state of enterprise IT. This special edition of the Insight Intelligent Technology Index™ was created to help IT professionals and their organizations understand the immediate and lingering impact of the covid-19 pandemic on enterprise IT. You’ll learn how organizations and IT teams adapted to the impacts of the global pandemic to support business continuity—and how strategic plans have been changed. Get the report. The top ten must-reads I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology. 1 We need to know more about coronavirus vaccine side effects 💉 “Mild” does not mean the same thing to you as it does to a Phase II trial researcher. (Wired $)   + Will covid-19 become the new common cold? (UnHerd) 2 Trying to calculate risks? You need a color-coded chart Is a dinner party okay? The dentist’s? A small wedding? These tools can help us work it out. (Wired $)   + Germany is recruiting 4,000 music fans to study how coronavirus spreads. (The Guardian)   + Germany’s coronavirus response shows the importance of good science communication. (CNBC) 3 The US has accused Chinese hackers of trying to steal covid-19 research The charges are mostly symbolic, since they’re unlikely to ever step foot in a US courtroom. (AP) 4 South Korea’s coronavirus quarantine app had major security flaws Attackers could see the names and real-time locations of people who were isolating. (NYT $) 5 The House has voted to ban TikTok from federal employees’ devices The crackdown continues. (Politico)   + TikTok has said it will hire 10,000 people in the US in the next three years. (Axios)   + US investors are considering buying a majority stake in TikTok. (Business Insider) 6 Apple has promised to go carbon-neutral by 2030 Tech giants are competing to unveil climate pledges, and that’s no bad thing. (BBC) 7 Bangladesh’s economy is run on Facebook There are hundreds of thousands of sellers plying their trade through the platform there. (Rest of World) 8 Twitter is cracking down on the QAnon conspiracy It said the ban will affect more than 150,000 accounts. (NPR) 9 How to spot fake Amazon reviews 🔍 This is why you should never rely on just the star rating alone. (The Markup)   + Jeff Bezos added $13 billion to his net worth in a single day. (CNET)   + Amazon has expanded its robot delivery trials to more states. (The Verge) 10 Randonauting is the fun activity of the summer It’s a way to pass the time. And you might coincidentally break the simulation we’re all living in. (The Atlantic) Don't settle for half the story. MIT Technology Review delivers insights on today's technologies and their impact upon our collective future through a trustworthy lens you won't find anywhere else. Get unlimited access when you subscribe today. Quote of the Day “It will probably, unfortunately, get worse before it gets better. Something I don’t like saying about things, but that’s the way it is.” —President Donald Trump abruptly departs from his usually rosy projections about the coronavirus in the first virus-focused televised news conference since April. Top image credit: NeONBRAND | Unsplash Please send roast chicken to hi@technologyreview.com. Follow me on Twitter at @charlottejee. Thanks for reading! —Charlotte Was this newsletter forwarded to you, and you'd like to see more? Sign up for free Leading with Innovation. Join us online, October 19-22. *View this in a browser You received this newsletter because you subscribed with your email address *Edit email preferences   |   *Unsubscribe from all emails Follow us: MIT Technology Review One Main Street Cambridge, MA 02142

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