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Build Better Futures with Ethical AI

A Credo AI Manifesto - We are living through a technological revolution.

January 3, 2022
Author(s)
Navrina Singh
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We are living through a technological revolution. The invention of agriculture broke humanity out of the long cycle of hunting and gathering. Writing equipped us to communicate knowledge across space and time. Trains, cars, and planes conquered distance. Electricity gave us power. The internet connected the world. And now, AI is automating the systems that shape our lives.

Science fiction no longer has a monopoly on AI. Whether you’re deciding how to phrase an email, what series to binge, who to date, or how to invest your savings, AI is influencing your choices. When you post a video on TikTok, go through security at an airport, submit your resume, apply for a loan, seek parole, or get screened for cancer, AI is determining your fate.

This isn’t magic, however much it might seem like it. By training machine learning models on vast datasets, data scientists use AI to identify subtle patterns and encode those patterns in algorithms. Then they delegate decisions to those algorithms, unlocking unprecedented possibilities. By taking humans out of the loop, AI can free us to realize our potential. But in doing so, AI also begets new dangers: algorithms lack the human judgment required to adapt to a changing world.

As we integrate AI into civilization’s fundamental infrastructure, these tradeoffs take on existential implications. Financial algorithms optimizing for maximal returns can lose everything because of a quirk in the market. Judicial algorithms optimizing for minimal recidivism can introduce bias and deny parole to those who deserve it. Social algorithms optimizing for engagement can divide a nation. The more autonomy we give our tools, the wider the range of unintended consequences. Extraordinary scale generates extraordinary impact, but not always the impact we intend.

The promise and perils of AI will define the 21st century, and to build a future we actually want to live in, we need to harness the promise and mitigate the perils. That’s why we’re building Credo AI: to put algorithms in service of humanity.

What does that mean in practice?

Many organizations want to do the right thing, but lack the tools to put their values into action. Data scientists, compliance officers, product leaders, marketers, ethicists, designers, and executives have no common vocabulary for weighing the risks and benefits of using AI to solve a particular problem. People with diverse expertise critical to ensuring that AI serves business and social goals aren’t in the room for crucial AI design decisions. Without a shared understanding, people improvise or ignore the problem entirely. Worse, there’s no holistic way to monitor AI development and deployment over time—along with the associated risks—blinding organizations to the structure and impact of evolving systems that are increasingly central to success, and preventing them from preempting or even explaining failure, let alone learning from it. 

The result is a mess: models widely adopted without appropriate oversight, manual compliance reviews that take months or even years, internal friction, liability exposure, talent churn, delays costing tens of millions of dollars, countless problems left unsolved, and public scandals that undermine everything a business aspires to achieve.

It doesn’t have to be this way. Credo AI provides a single platform that empowers you to manage the risks of AI deployment at scale. Data scientists and engineers can evaluate the technical risks of the models they’re building. Compliance officers can review decision logs. Policy analysts can check progress against emerging regulations. Marketers can track brand risk. Executives can see the impact on the bottom line. Together, teams of diverse stakeholders can establish what “good” looks like and transform AI from a source of risk into a source of value, earning the trust they need to succeed over the long term.

By integrating technical assessment and audit tools with policy and process tracking, Credo AI is creating a comprehensive solution for AI governance. Companies, governments, and nonprofits are simply groups of people working together toward a common goal. That means that even though AI is an unprecedented innovation, organizations are using our platform to harness long-standing governance best practices ensuring the AI systems they build are fair, robust, explainable, and accountable.

This is just the beginning. As individuals experiment with open-source tools, businesses incorporate machine learning into diverse applications, and governments draft AI laws, humanity is collectively defining what it means for this immensely powerful new technology to be used ethically. Algorithms do not exist in isolation. AI systems are embedded in human systems—a feedback loop that is refactoring our economy and society. We don’t have all the answers, but Credo AI exists to render these evolving systems transparent and auditable so that organizations can responsibly invent a better future by leveraging the best of what machines and people have to offer.

Credo AI is more than just a product. We are a community of practice. We believe that we ourselves must embody the change we seek. We aim to grow a team of builders and businesspeople, a movement of customers and partners, a coalition of researchers and regulators and changemakers, all working to build technologies worthy of trust.

Making good on AI’s profound potential requires profound integrity. Those who summon the courage to lead by putting their values into action are setting standards that will bend the course of history. If that’s you, then you’re the kind of person Credo AI seeks to serve, and with whom we will strive to build an abundant, equitable future.

The stakes are only getting higher, so let’s get to work.

Navrina

Founder & CEO
Credo AI