Page 76 - Fortune-November 01, 2018

TECH
FOCUS

it was deployed in the city last year.
Megvii, meanwhile, supports the
state’s nationwide surveillance pro-
gram, which China, with troubling
inferences, calls Skynet. Launched
in 2005, Skynet aims to create a
nationwide panopticon by blanket-
ing the country with CCTV. Thanks
to Face++, it now incorporates mil-
lions of A.I.-enhanced cameras that
have been used to apprehend some
2,000 suspects since 2016, accord-
ing to a Workers’ Daily report.
China claims such tech will be
used to track fugitives and locate
missing people, but the potential
for misuse is obvious. Both Sense-
Time and Megvii have absolved
themselves of any responsibility
for how their technology is used,
claiming to simply be suppliers,
Tang Xiao’ou, an expert in the field of Police officers not rulemakers. (Both companies declined
computer vision technology, and his protégé, use A.I.-powered to comment.)
Xu Li, who now serves as CEO. Today Sense- eyewear on the For Luciano Floridi, director of Oxford Uni-
street in Luoyang,
Time is the world’s most valuable A.I. startup, Henan province, versity’s Digital Ethics Lab, this shirking of
with a valuation of at least $4.5 billion. China, in April responsibility doesn’t fly. “The justification of
At an estimated $2 billion, rival Megvii is 2018. saying ‘Oh, we’re just producing a tool’ has not
less valuable. But the company is the origina- worked since we started sharpening stones a
tor of the world’s largest open-source facial long time ago,” he says.
recognition platform, Face++. More than In the U.S., some companies are actively
300,000 developers use Face++ to build their seeking oversight for A.I. applications. In
own face detection programs. Founded in July, Microsoft, which both researches and
2011 by three graduates of Tsinghua Univer- commercializes A.I., called for “a government
sity—China’s MIT equivalent—Megvii claims “The initiative to regulate the proper use of facial
it wants to “build the eyes and the brain” of intention recognition technology.” Meanwhile, Axon,
Chinese cities and extend police powers to a istoweave formerly Taser, has established an external
point “beyond what is humanly possible.” advisory board to guide its development of
For China’s government, that means not atighter A.I.-fitted police gear.
only being able to identify any of its 1.4 billion netofsocial Jeffrey Ding, an Oxford University re-
citizens within a matter of seconds but also searcher focused on Chinese A.I., believes
having the ability to record an individual’s controlthat there is more pushback in the West against
behavior to predict who might become a makesit deploying facial recognition technology for
threat—a real-world version of the “precrime” security purposes. “There’s more willingness
in Philip K. Dick’s Minority Report. harderfor in China to adopt it,” he says, “or at least to
To get there, the government is both bene- peopleto trial it.”
factor to and beneficiary of companies like But there’s also less freedom to oppose the
Megvii and SenseTime. More than 40 mu- planaction onslaught. “The intention of these systems is
nicipal police forces, known locally as Public orpushthe to weave a tighter net of social control that
Security Bureaus, have purchased surveillance makes it harder for people to plan action or
systems from SenseTime. The company says government push the government to reform,” explains
its tech has helped Guangzhou police identify toreform.” Maya Wang, senior China researcher at Hu-
more than 2,000 suspects, arrest more than man Rights Watch. With ever more intelligent ST RINGER/REU T ERS
800 people, and solve close to 100 cases since cameras, who will watch the watchers?

38
FO R T U N E. CO M // N O V. 1 . 1 8