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AI language models such as OpenAI's ChatGPT partially receive data with the help of low-wage workers. Contractors in poor countries pay small sums to fix chatbot data, label images, and the like. On May 22, 97 African workers who train artificial intelligence or moderate content for companies like Meta and OpenAI published an open letter to President Biden demanding an end to the “systematic abuse and exploitation of African workers” by American tech companies.
- Most of the letter's signatories live in Kenya, a technology outsourcing hub whose president, William Ruto, is visiting the US this week. Workers claim practices by companies such as Meta, OpenAI and data provider Scale AI “amount to modern slavery.”
- The letter states that a typical workday for African workers involves “viewing murders and beheadings, child abuse and rape, pornography and bestiality, often for more than 8 hours a day.” Pay is less than $2 an hour, and workers often suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder – a well-documented problem among content moderators around the world.
The work includes reviewing content on platforms such as Facebook, TikTok and Instagram, as well as tagging images and training chatbot responses for companies such as OpenAI. The employees are affiliated with the African Union of Content Moderators, the continent's first union of content moderators, and a group founded by laid-off employees who previously trained artificial intelligence models for companies such as Scale AI, which sells data packages and data labeling services to clients including OpenAI. Meta and the US Army. The letter was published on the website of UK activist group Foxglove, which promotes tech unionism and fair technology.
The letter says that in March, Scale AI suddenly banned people from Kenya, Nigeria and Pakistan from working on Remotasks, Scale AI's platform for contract work. The letter states that these workers were fired without notice and were owed significant amounts of unpaid wages.
“When Remotasks closed, it took our livelihoods out of our hands, food out of our kitchens. But Scale AI, the big company that ran the platform, is still getting away with it because it's based in San Francisco,” says Joan Kinyua, a former Remotasks employee.
While the Biden administration has often described its approach to labor policy as pro-worker, the letter from African workers argues that this does not apply to them: “We are being treated as disposable.”
“You have the power to stop our exploitation by American companies, clean up this work, and provide us with dignity and fair working conditions. You can see that there are good jobs for Kenyans, not just Americans,” the letter said.
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Tech contractors in Kenya have filed many lawsuits in recent years alleging that tech outsourcing companies and their American clients such as Meta treated workers illegally. The letter to Biden demands that he ensure that U.S. tech companies do business with overseas tech workers in a manner that respects local laws and does not engage in union-busting practices. It also proposes that technology companies should be held accountable in US courts for their illegal operations, particularly for human rights and labor violations.
The letter comes just over a year after 150 workers formed the African Union of Content Moderators. According to workers, Meta immediately fired almost all of its 300 moderators in Kenya and effectively destroyed the newly formed union. The company has now received three lawsuits from more than 180 Kenyan workers demanding more humane working conditions, freedom to organize and payment of back wages.
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