Google CEO Sundar Pichai recently addressed the public upset with its artificial intelligence-powered chatbot, Gemini, for its political bias. He vowed to further develop the company's AI systems specifically to counter so-called fake news.
In other words, Google will use AI more for censorship.
In addressing the controversy surrounding Gemini, Pichai said he understands that some of its responses have offended users and shown bias.
"To be clear, that's completely unacceptable and we got it wrong," he said. Notably, this statement did not address the fact that Google's bias has been on public display for years and was especially prevalent beginning in August 2017, when Pichai fired a Google employee named James Damore for writing a 10-page memo criticizing the company's diversity, equity and inclusion policies, or DEI.
The partisan bias of Google was also on display during an all-hands meeting after Donald Trump was elected president in 2016.
"I certainly find this election deeply offensive," Google co-founder Sergey Brin said at the time. "And I know many of you do too."
One Google executive nearly started crying when recounting that Trump won. "It was this massive kick in the gut that we were gonna lose," she said. "And it was really painful."
Pichai struck a more neutral political tone in comparison to his colleagues. "We are in a democratic system," he said. "I think part of the reason the outcome ended up the way it is is [because] people don't feel heard across both sides."
Google to develop AI to police online speech
A Google employee close to Pichai reportedly suggested after Trump's victory that he won due to "misinformation" and "fake news coming from fake news websites being shared by millions of low-information voters on social media," said Pichai, recalling the conversation with the employee. He added that he believes AI can be used to counter this so-called misinformation.
"I think our investments in machine learning and AI is a big opportunity here," he said, before adding that Google may already be manipulating search results to discourage so-called misinformation.
"There are many, many places where we are ranking [search results]," he admitted. "We are algorithmically doing stuff … understanding some of the things that are happening, and course correcting."
Pichai emphasized that there would be a technological solution to the information that Google executives believed had resulted in Trump's victory.
"This is a problem of scale and not being able to keep up. Human systems fail in many of these things. So I think investing more in machine learning and AI could be one way we actually make progress," said Pichai.
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