AI Ethics: Listen to these three voices

Welcome to the 16 new deep divers who joined us since last Wednesday. If you haven’t already, subscribe and join our community in receiving weekly AI insights, updates, and interviews with industry experts straight to your feed.

DeepDive

Your weekly immersion in AI. 

“Investing in women and including their perspectives in AI will spur innovation, generate economic opportunities, and enable us to minimise harms while maximising benefits for all.” 

We asked DeepFest 2025 speaker Mia Shah-Dand (CEO at Lighthouse3; Founder at Women in AI Ethics™) to tell us about three women she thinks everyone should be listening to right now. 

It was a tough question (to pick only three of many people who are doing invaluable work). But Mia shared these three champions of ethical AI: 

• Dr. Timnit Gebru
• Dr. Safiya Noble
• Dr. Alex Hanna 

Discover their work, put their books on your reading list, and add your voice to the growing chorus of AI leaders calling for an ethical AI future. But before you do that, read our interview with Mia. 

Why is it critical that women's voices are heard in conversations around AI ethics? 

“Technologies reflect the values and priorities of those funding and building them. The underrepresentation of women and other minority groups in the tech industry, especially in leadership roles, shows up as bias in AI models. Any technology or software that generates accurate results for one dominant group and yields inaccurate output and errors for others, is unacceptable.   

“Women are at the forefront of AI Ethics because many scholars and researchers who interrogated these systems found that they are not designed or optimised for us. It was a brilliant Black researcher at MIT, Dr. Joy Buolamwini, who uncovered that results from commercial facial recognition systems are less accurate for dark-skinned women. 

“The inclusion of women’s perspectives and those of other underrepresented groups in tech during decision-making, design, and development stages is critical for preventing discriminatory and unethical outcomes from AI systems.”

Can you tell us about three women you think everyone should be listening to right now?  

“I published the first ‘100 Brilliant Women in AI Ethics™’ list in 2018 when the importance of AI Ethics wasn’t as widely acknowledged. Since then, our organisation Women in AI Ethics™ has published the list annually to highlight the women making vital contributions to AI.  

“There are a significant number of incredibly talented women in this space but if I had to pick only three, I’d start with Dr. Timnit Gebru, founder of Distributed AI Research Institute (DAIR), who is a pioneer in this field and fierce champion for ethical AI. 

“Next is Dr. Safiya Noble, whose work is foundational to our awareness of bias in popular search engines and her book Algorithms of Oppression is essential reading for anyone interested in AI Ethics. 

“Last but certainly not the least, I would recommend Dr. Alex Hanna, Director of Research at DAIR, and suggest that everyone pre-order her upcoming book The AI Con to demystify the hype around AI.” 

Have you observed any significant change in diversity in the AI space since you first launched Women in AI Ethics?  

“There have been many significant changes in the AI space since I launched Women in AI Ethics™ – but not all of them are positive. 

“I’m glad to see growing interest in responsible and ethical AI, especially among women as a career choice. There are many emerging roles where women from non-technology backgrounds like legal, human resources, risk management, and compliance can apply their expertise in building AI guardrails to protect users and organisations.  

“However, the discourse on AI Ethics has been overshadowed by the surge in popularity of Generative AI. The risks to women have increased with the proliferation of AI tools that facilitate gender-based (online) violence, while funding for women-led tech startups and representation of women in tech leadership continues to be dismal.”

What needs to happen to facilitate more diverse involvement in AI?  

“Historians like Mar Hicks and others have found that when women dominate a field, their contributions are not valued at the same level as men and pay for that entire field drops lower. To address the gender gap in tech and encourage more diverse involvement in AI, we also need to close this pay equity gap. 

“We need to push back against the stereotypical image of an AI expert as a computer scientist or engineer, which also happens to be roles and fields dominated by men. We must update our criteria for technological competence and expertise instead of using outdated standards.

“Finally, we must include perspectives from subject matter experts in AI, like nurses and teachers, rather than parachuting technologists without context or relevant expertise into high-stakes environments like healthcare and education.”

How do you think DeepFest could contribute to advancing and amplifying women and other diverse voices?  

“For over a decade, my consulting firm Lighthouse3 has advised large organisations on responsible development and ethical use of emerging technologies like AI. There is a growing community of impressive women around the globe building responsible AI solutions and conducting cutting-edge AI Ethics research. I am delighted to see that DeepFest is featuring some of these AI leaders, Navrina Singh and Manail Anais, this year.  

“Investing in women and including their perspectives in AI will spur innovation, generate economic opportunities, and enable us to minimise harms while maximising benefits for all.”