{"id":318394,"date":"2019-05-22T11:00:53","date_gmt":"2019-05-22T09:00:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=318394"},"modified":"2019-05-22T11:00:53","modified_gmt":"2019-05-22T09:00:53","slug":"amazons-alexa-and-apples-siri-reinforce-gender-bias-un-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/technology\/318394\/amazons-alexa-and-apples-siri-reinforce-gender-bias-un-report\/","title":{"rendered":"Amazon’s Alexa and Apple’s Siri reinforce gender bias: UN report"},"content":{"rendered":"

A new report<\/a> <\/strong>published by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) argues that female AI-assistants reinforce gender bias.<\/p>\n

Currently, the vast majority of these assistants – from Amazon\u2019s Alexa and Apple’s Siri to Microsoft\u2019s Cortana – are projected as female, in name, sound of voice and \u2018personality\u2019, the researchers said.<\/p>\n

The report, titled \u2018I\u2019d blush if I could\u2019, borrows its name from the response Siri, Apple\u2019s female-gendered voice assistant used by nearly half a billion people, would give when a human user told \u2018her\u2019, \u201cHey Siri, you\u2019re a bi***.\u201d<\/p>\n

“Siri\u2019s submissiveness in the face of gender abuse – and the servility expressed by so many other digital assistants projected as young women \u2013 provides a powerful illustration of gender biases coded into technology products, pervasive in the technology sector and apparent in digital skills education,” said Saniye G\u00fclser Corat, Unesco’s director for Gender Equality.<\/p>\n

“The world needs to pay much closer attention to how, when and whether AI technologies are gendered and, crucially, who is gendering them.”<\/p>\n

It found that these AI-assistants:<\/p>\n