Pakistani scholars among winners of Facebook’s Ethics in AI Research awards

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s Junaid Qadir, Professor at the knowledge Technology University (ITU) of Punjab, alongside co-investigator Amana Raquib, professor at the Institute of Business Administration (IBA), Karachi were announced winners of the Ethics in AI Research Initiative for the Asia Pacific, by Facebook.

The duo was among the winners from nine different countries. The AI initiative aims to help support thoughtful and ground-breaking academic research in the field of artificial intelligence (AI) ethics.

Dr. Junaid Kadir along with Amana Raquib was awarded for their research into culturally informed pro-social AI regulation and persuasion framework.
To support AI ethics research within the Asia Pacific, Facebook partnered with the Centre for Civil Society and Governance of The University of Hong Kong and therefore the Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data, Hong Kong (PCPD; esteemed co-chair of the Permanent working party on Ethics and Data Protection in AI of the worldwide Privacy Assembly) to launch an invitation for proposals (RFP) in December 2019. The RFP was hospitable academic institutions, think tanks, and research organizations registered and operational across the Asia Pacific.

Head of Privacy and Data Policy, Engagement, APAC at Facebook, Raina Yeung said:

“At Facebook, we believe our understanding of AI should be told by research conducted in open collaboration with the community. That’s why we’re keen to support independent academic research institutions in APAC to pursue interdisciplinary research in AI ethics which will enable ongoing dialogue on these important issues in the application of AI technology that features a lot of potentials to profit society and mankind.”

“We’re excited to be awarded this grant and are looking forward to beginning this project. Artificial Intelligence (AI) has great potential to facilitate sustainable human development goals, but it also has significant potential for abuse. Through this work, a culturally-informed, pro-social AI framework for Pakistan and therefore the Muslim world is going to be proposed. In this regard, the rich Islamic legal tradition and therefore the work on objectives (Maqāsid) of shariah are going to be leveraged for studying contemporary AI-related issues,” said Junaid Qadir, the Principal Investigator (PI) of the project.

“Through the proposed framework, the project team will seek to interact with other AI ethics frameworks and propose new insights which will advance the overall body of data on AI and Islamic ethical principles and guidelines,” he added.

Junaid Qadir may be a professor at the knowledge Technology University (ITU) of Punjab, Lahore since April 2020, where he also is the chairperson of the EE Department since January 2019. He completed his Ph.D. from the University of latest South Wales (UNSW), Australia in 2008, and his Bachelors's in EE from the University of Engineering and Technology (UET), Lahore, Pakistan in 2000.

Amana Raquib, the co-PI of the project, has completed her doctorate, summa worthy, in Religious Philosophy and Ethics from the University of Queensland, Australia. She had earlier completed her undergraduate in Philosophy from the University of Karachi. She is the author of the book “Islamic Ethics of Technology: An Objectives’ (Maqasid) Approach.”