Thursday 14 March 2024
12:30
Verity Harding
AI Needs You: How We Can Change AI's Future and Save Our Own
AI will permeate our lives in unforeseeable ways, but it is clear that the shape of AI’s future—and of our own—cannot be left only to those building it. Verity argues that it is critical for society to take the lead in figuring out what, and who, this technology is really for, if we are to guide it away from our worst fears and toward a future that we can trust and believe in.
Verity is Founder of Formation Advisory Ltd, a technology consultancy firm, and Director of the AI & Geopolitics Project at Cambridge University’s Bennett Institute for Public Policy. Her debut book ‘AI Needs You: how we can change AI’s future and save our own’, will be published by Princeton University Press in March 2024.
Harding’s career has been focussed on the intersection of technology and democracy. She spent a decade at Alphabet, latterly as DeepMind’s first Global Head of Public Policy, where in 2017 she co-founded the company’s research and ethics unit as well as the independent multi-stakeholder organisation the Partnership on AI. She was also a member of the OECD’s Network of AI Experts in 2018-19, the body which developed the first intergovernmental standard on AI, adopted by the G20 and beyond. Prior to this, Harding was Head of Security Policy for Google in Europe covering issues such as online extremism and encryption and, before moving to the tech industry, served the British Government as a Special Adviser to the Deputy Prime Minister the Rt Hon Sir Nick Clegg. In her spare time, Harding serves on the Cabinet Office Digital Advisory Board, a group of independent experts recruited to provide insight on digital, data, and technology to the UK government.
AI, technology and public policy expert
Verity is Founder of Formation Advisory Ltd, a technology consultancy firm, and Director of the AI & Geopolitics Project at Cambridge University’s Bennett Institute for Public Policy. Her debut book ‘AI Needs You: how we can change AI’s future and save our own’, will be published by Princeton University Press in March 2024.
Harding’s career has been focussed on the intersection of technology and democracy. She spent a decade at Alphabet, latterly as DeepMind’s first Global Head of Public Policy, where in 2017 she co-founded the company’s research and ethics unit as well as the independent multi-stakeholder organisation the Partnership on AI. She was also a member of the OECD’s Network of AI Experts in 2018-19, the body which developed the first intergovernmental standard on AI, adopted by the G20 and beyond. Prior to this, Harding was Head of Security Policy for Google in Europe covering issues such as online extremism and encryption and, before moving to the tech industry, served the British Government as a Special Adviser to the Deputy Prime Minister the Rt Hon Sir Nick Clegg. In her spare time, Harding serves on the Cabinet Office Digital Advisory Board, a group of independent experts recruited to provide insight on digital, data, and technology to the UK government.
