Companies announce facial recognition moratoriums, the White House suspends certain work visas, and the NDAA advances

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Worth Knowing

Companies Halt Facial Recognition Sales to Police: Amazon and Microsoft joined IBM in announcing they have suspended or intend to suspend police use of their facial recognition systems. Amazon is implementing a one-year moratorium, and Microsoft, which does not currently sell facial recognition to the police, said it will not do so until a national law governs the technology. IBM previously announced it no longer sold general purpose facial recognition systems. The companies called for facial recognition legislation; Congress is considering a measure to restrict law enforcement’s use of the technology.
Depixelating Algorithm Prompts Debate About Racial Bias in AI: A machine learning model intended to make pixelated photos clearer is being criticized for producing photos with whitened skin. Researchers at Duke University created an algorithm that generates clear photos from grainy images of people. However, users realized the output photos were of white people even when inputs were not; one example replaced a photo of President Obama with a white man. The results sparked a discussion about the causes of bias in machine learning: Yann LeCun, Chief AI Scientist at Facebook, said biased data was the problem, while Timnit Gebru, co-lead of Google’s Ethical AI Team, argued that datasets alone won’t fix bias in AI.
Machine Learning Spotlight — Predicting the Shape of 3D Objects: Oxford University researchers developed a method to generate rotated photos of 3D objects. Receiving a single photo of a person, animal or object as input, their model can generate images of the object at other angles, despite lacking empirical information about it. The system identifies the likely symmetric axis in the photo, as well as the probability the object is symmetrical, and uses that information to generate a 3D reconstruction. The model outperforms other state-of-the-art systems and received the Best Paper Award at the 2020 IEEE Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition last week.
Government Updates

White House Proclamation Suspends Certain Visas Through 2020: President Trump signed an executive order on Monday halting certain temporary worker visas and extending a ban on green cards through the end of the year. The order suspends H-1B, H-2B, L-1 and some J-1 visas for individuals outside of the United States, as well as related dependent visas. It also extends the 60-day ban on entry for green card applicants that President Trump signed on April 22. One estimate suggests the proclamation will bar 219,000 temporary workers and 158,000 green card applicants. CSET research has found that the leading U.S. AI firms attract top international talent with the H-1B visa, and that restrictive immigration policies threaten to undermine long-term U.S. AI progress.

FY21 NDAA Advances, Including Provisions on AI: The Senate Armed Services Committee approved its version of the National Defense Authorization Act on June 10, including several provisions on AI. It tasks the Secretary of Defense with prototyping five uses of AI to support personnel and management functions, requires an analysis of efforts by China and the United States to recruit and retain STEM talent and allocates $132 million to Joint AI Center operational systems development. The House Armed Services Subcommittees also approved their NDAA marks this week, including provisions that place responsibility for the Joint AI Center under the Deputy Secretary of Defense, create a JAIC Board of Directors and require the development of DOD-wide data-sharing standards. The full HASC debate is scheduled for July 1. 

Bill to Increase AI Talent in DOD Introduced: Last Tuesday, Senate AI Caucus co-founders and co-chairs Sens. Heinrich and Portman introduced the AI for Armed Forces Act. The bipartisan legislation modifies the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery to assess AI skills and allows senior officials to waive GS qualification standards for AI talent. It also mandates that the Director of the Joint AI Center report directly to the Secretary of Defense. The legislation implements several recommendations made by the National Security Commission on AI in March. Reps. Langevin and Stefanik also introduced legislation authorizing special immigrant status for select non-citizens working in STEM areas essential to national security, including AI; the legislation allows 100 participants in the first year and up to 500 per year by 2025. 

Semiconductor Industry Funding Bill Introduced: Sens. Cornyn, Warner, Risch, Rubio and Sinema introduced the bipartisan Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors for America Act. The bill includes $23 billion in funding for federal research, matching programs to incentivize building advanced chip factories, and developing secure microelectronic supply chains with allies. It also creates a 40 percent refundable tax credit to encourage building chip factories, establishes a National Institute for Standards and Technologies Semiconductor Program, and authorizes the DOD to establish and enhance domestic chip production capabilities. Rep. McCaul introduced a companion bill in the House.

In Translation
CSET’s translations of significant foreign language documents on AI

13th Five-Year Plan for Military-Civil Fusion: The 13th Five-Year Special Plan for S&T Military-Civil Fusion Development. This Ministry of Science and Technology plan outlines China’s priorities for “military-civil fusion” in the years 2016–2020. The plan aims to eliminate stovepipes between the Chinese military and the civilian innovation ecosystem. The Chinese term “military-civil fusion” refers to the mutually reinforcing two-way flow of technology and other resources between the military and civilian sectors.

What We’re Reading

Report: 2020 State of the U.S. Semiconductor Industry, Semiconductor Industry Association (June 2020)

Report: 2020 AI Talent Report: Current Landscape & Market Trends, TalentSeer (January 2020)

Report: China’s Military-Civil Fusion Strategy: A View from Chinese Strategists, China Aerospace Studies Institute (June 2020)

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