Cannes: Industry leaders announce coalition to fight bias in ad tech
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Published 06.21.2022
Topic
Technology
Delta Air Lines, WPP, The 4As, the IAB, the Ad Council and other industry leaders back IBM in delivering an open source toolkit that enables the industry to use AI to mitigate bias in ad tech.
A year ago, IBM Watson Advertising launched a research initiative to understand and mitigate unintended bias in digital advertising using artificial intelligence. In January 2022 the results of that research revealed that, while unwanted bias in advertising is prevalent, AI can be used as an effective tool to alleviate it.
Now, in an effort to rally industry participation around the issue, IBM is joining forces with an industry coalition of leaders to pledge their commitment to generating awareness around the issue — and driving action.
At the Cannes Lions Festival of International Creativity on Monday (June 20), IBM announced that Delta Air Lines, WPP, The 4As, the IAB and The Ad Council have pledged their support to mitigate bias in advertising, recognizing it as an industry-wide issue.
“I don’t think any of us should be precious about DEIB. We all need to share our learnings and make sure we’re driving change across the industry,” Marla Kaplowitz, CEO and president of the 4As, told Campaign US. “The pledge is a way to not only acknowledge that bias exists, but also that we are going to work as much as we can to unearth bias, talk to clients about it, and while we’ll never fully eradicate it, make sure we’re aware of biases and try to reduce them.”
