Caribbean L 10 ife, JUNE 11-17, 2021
Congresswoman Yvette D. Clarke. Photo by Nelson A. King
Clarke, colleagues urge Google
to conduct audit on racial equity
By Nelson A. King
Caribbean American Democratic
Congresswoman Yvette D. Clarke,
founder and chair of the Congressional
Racial Disparities Working Group,
recently joined by her colleague, Rep.
Jan Schakowsky (IL-09), and eight others
in penning a letter to tech conglomerate,
Alphabet Inc., the parent company
of YouTube and Google, demanding
an internal audit on racial equity within
its platforms.
The legislators’ letter followed one
dispatched earlier month from US
Sens. Cory Booker (D-NJ), Ron Wyden
(D-OR), Mark Warner (D-VA), Edward
Markey (D-MA), and Richard Blumenthal
(D-CT) calling for the racial equity
audit.
“While technologies like those used
by Google are based on algorithmic
calculations, these outputs too often
reflect programmers’ biases or the biases
of data sets used to train the systems,”
said Clarke, the daughter of Jamaican
immigrants, who represents the 9th
Congressional District in Brooklyn.
“These biases prevent excluded individuals
from seeing search results for
housing, employment, credit, education
or many essential services,” she
said. “As a result, people of color and
other underserved groups are consistently
marginalized and often deprived
of equitable opportunities on Alphabet’s
platforms and other online platforms.”
Clarke said that when critical opportunities
are hidden from a person
because of his or her name, or when an
app designed to detect skin conditions
is ineffective or does not adequately
register with people of color, “it creates
a culture of marginalization and prioritization
that disproportionately harms
communities of color.
“It is Alphabet Inc’s responsibility to
one, conduct this audit, and two, implement
measures to take accountability
for the inherent biases within their
technologies, and change this harmful
culture in favor of an equitable and
innovative system that does not marginalize
communities of color,” he said.
“Unless mega-corporations like Alphabet,
Inc., begin to address these glaring
issues of bias, they will continue to
entrench themselves into our society.
Which is unacceptable, and they must
act immediately.”
Schakowsky said: “It’s clear that
Alphabet is not serious about ending
bias aimed at people of color.
“The time for apologies is over,” she
said. “They went as far as to fire a
researcher working to address bias in
AI, Dr. Timnit Gebru. Their actions
need to match their words.
“Alphabet should demonstrate their
commitment to racial equity throughout
their platforms and workplace by
conducting a racial equity audit immediately,”
Schakowsky urged.
Rashad Robinson, president of Color
of Change, said that, “it is past due
that Google make the structural changes
necessary to eradicate the racism
ingrained in their business practices
and on their platform.
“Big Tech must face the consequences
for disregarding racial equity and
continuing to exploit Black communities
and employees,” he said. “In order
to adequately address racial bias in
technology, Alphabet Inc. must conduct
a comprehensive racial equity audit
using a vetted framework that has been
proven to produce real solutions, rather
than a framework developed by compromised
consultants and corporate
law firms.
As Borough President, Jo Anne will: