FTC Hearings #7: Artificial Intelligence, Algorithms, and Predictive Analytics

Posted by Project Disco

FTC Hearings #7: Artificial Intelligence, Algorithms, and Predictive Analytics

Last week, the FTC held the seventh session of its hearings on Competition and Consumer Protection in the 21st Century at Howard University School of Law with the spotlight on algorithms, artificial intelligence (“AI”), and predictive analytics. The overarching themes of this two-day hearing were to understand the fundamental aspects of AI and algorithms, how AI could impact consumer protection, and to discuss antitrust and regulatory issues for AI.

UNDERSTANDING ALGORITHMS, AI, AND PREDICTIVE ANALYTICS

Panelists took turns describing the many real applications of AI. Dana Rao, Executive VP and General Counsel at Adobe, demonstrated that AI has the ability to segment out a section of a photo and seamlessly import another picture of the desired lighting or background in to replace that section. However, he noted that for AI to work this way there would need to be lots of data points and artists in order to train the AI:

“How do we make AI beneficial? You need access to data, and access to a variety of data. That kind of access to data [is what will] eliminate bias.”