What really happened when Google ousted Timnit Gebru

Protecting the industry’s favorite technology.

She was a star engineer who warned that messy AI can spread racism. Google brought her in. Then it forced her out. Tom Simonite unravels the controversial circumstances surrounding Timnit Gebru’s exit from Google, and the complex backdrop surrounding it.

It’s the story of a "gifted engineer swept up in the AI revolution", "a refugee who worked her way to the center of the tech industry", and "a company — the world’s fifth-largest — trying to regain its equilibrium".

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Part 1: AI, ethics and engineers

"It wasn’t just the algorithms or their training data that skewed white."

She was a star engineer who warned that messy AI can spread racism. Google brought her in. Then it forced her out. Tom Simonite unravels the controversial circumstances surrounding Timnit Gebru’s exit from Google, and the complex backdrop surrounding it. 

“I’m not worried about machines taking over the world,” Gebru wrote. “I’m worried about groupthink, insularity, and arrogance in the AI community.” In this instalment, Simonite takes a closer look into the engineer’s meteoric rise in the field of Artificial Intelligence, and how her drive for social justice landed her the job at Google in the first place.

Part 2: The engineer’s meteoric rise

Why the reluctant computer scientist took the role.

She was a star engineer who warned that messy AI can spread racism. Google brought her in. Then it forced her out. Tom Simonite unravels the controversial circumstances surrounding Timnit Gebru’s exit from Google, and the complex backdrop surrounding it. 

In the penultimate part of the story, we learn of Gebru’s precarious position in the company from the outset. From ethical AI concerns, to sexism and wider, cultural issues within the company — and, finally, to the paper that resulted in her forced exit from the company.

Part 3: Set up to fail?

The aftermath from the fallout.

She was a star engineer who warned that messy AI can spread racism. Google brought her in. Then it forced her out. Tom Simonite unravels the controversial circumstances surrounding Timnit Gebru’s exit from Google, and the complex backdrop surrounding it. 

“In-house ethical AI research may forever be held in suspicion.” In the final part of this story, we learn about exactly what happened at Google after Gebru’s exit — and what this means for the future of ethics in AI.