AI for Good was established in 2017 by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the United Nations (UN) agency for digital technologies. The platform is co-convened with the Government of Switzerland and in partnership UN agencies. Its founding mission is to identify innovative applications of

artificial intelligence Artificial intelligence (AI) is the capability of computer, computational systems to perform tasks typically associated with human intelligence, such as learning, reasoning, problem-solving, perception, and decision-making. It is a field of re ...

(AI) to solve global challenges. AI for Good arose from collaboration between ITU and IBM Watson AI XPRIZE. The first AI for Good Global Summit 2017 was held in Geneva, Switzerland and is since held annually.

Activity

With the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and global shutdowns, AI for Good moved online in March 2020. The platform has 37,000 contributors from more than 180 countries. Since 2023 AI for Good hosts a physical Global Summit in Geneva again annually. AI for Good has supported Global Initiatives on AI and Data Commons, AI for Health (in partnership with WHO), on Resilience to Natural Hazards through AI Solutions (former ITU/WMO/UNEP Focus Group on Artificial Intelligence for Natural Disaster Management (FG-AI4NDM) ), AI and Multimedia authenticity standards collaboration (under the World Standards Cooperation), AI for Road Safety (in partnership with UNECE) and pre-standardization focus groups on Artificial Intelligence Native for Telecommunication Networks (FG-AINN), AI and Internet of Things (IoT) for Digital Agriculture (in partnership with FAO), concluded focus groups on AI and Environmental Efficiency, Machine Learning and 5G. AI for Good is guided by Resolution 214 of the ITU Plenipotentiary Conference, and amplified by Resolution A/78/L.49 of the UN General Assembly. The adoption of Resolution COM4/AI at WTSA-24 describes ITU's mandate and AI for Good's role in AI development.

Global summit 2017

The first AI for Good Global summit took place from 7 to 9 June 2017. Speakers at the event included: *

Pedro Domingos Pedro Domingos (born 1965) is a Professor Emeritus of computer science and engineering at the University of Washington. He is a researcher in machine learning known for Markov logic network enabling uncertain inference. Education Domingos rece ...

Fei-Fei Li Fei-Fei Li (; born in Beijing, China, July 3, 1976) is a Chinese-American computer scientist known for her pioneering work in artificial intelligence (AI), particularly in computer vision. She is best known for establishing ImageNet, the dat ...

Gary Marcus Gary Fred Marcus (born 1970) is an American psychologist, cognitive scientist, and author, known for his research on the intersection of cognitive psychology, neuroscience, and artificial intelligence (AI). Marcus is professor ''emeritus'' of ps ...

* Stuart J. Russell *

Jürgen Schmidhuber Jürgen Schmidhuber (born 17 January 1963) is a German computer scientist noted for his work in the field of artificial intelligence, specifically artificial neural networks. He is a scientific director of the Dalle Molle Institute for Artifici ...

António Guterres António Manuel de Oliveira Guterres (born 30 April 1949) is a Portuguese politician and diplomat who is serving as the ninth and current secretary-general of the United Nations since 2017. A member of the Socialist Party (Portugal), ...

Rupert Stadler Rupert Stadler (born 17 March 1963) is a German businessman and former chairman of the Vorstand (CEO) of Audi AG. He was arrested in June 2018 in connection with the Volkswagen emissions scandal. He was in custody in Germany until being released ...

* Manuela M. Veloso *

Peter Norvig Peter Norvig (born 14 December 1956) is an American computer scientist and Distinguished Education Fellow at the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI. He previously served as a director of research and search quality at Google. Norvig is th ...

Christopher Fabian Christopher Fabian (born April 18, 1980) is a technologist who works for UNICEF. He founded technology and finance initiatives in both the public and private sector, including the creation in 2006, of UNICEF's Innovation Unit. Fabian is an advo ...

* Peter Lee One of the outcomes of the 2017 Global Summit was the creation of an

ITU-T The International Telecommunication Union Telecommunication Standardization Sector (ITU-T) is one of the three Sectors (branches) of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). It is responsible for coordinating Standardization, standards fo ...

Focus Group on Machine Learning for 5G.

Global summit 2018

The second AI for Good Global Summit took place from 15 to 17 May 2018 at the

ITU The International Telecommunication Union (ITU)In the other common languages of the ITU: * * is a specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for many matters related to information and communication technologies. It was established ...

headquarters in

Geneva Geneva ( , ; ) ; ; . is the List of cities in Switzerland, second-most populous city in Switzerland and the most populous in French-speaking Romandy. Situated in the southwest of the country, where the Rhône exits Lake Geneva, it is the ca ...

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

and generated 35 AI project proposals. Speakers included: *

Roger Penrose Sir Roger Penrose (born 8 August 1931) is an English mathematician, mathematical physicist, Philosophy of science, philosopher of science and Nobel Prize in Physics, Nobel Laureate in Physics. He is Emeritus Rouse Ball Professor of Mathematics i ...

Samantha Cristoforetti Samantha Cristoforetti (; born 26 April 1977) is an Italian European Astronaut Corps, European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut, former Italian Air Force pilot and engineer. She is the second of two Women in space, women sent into space by ESA and ...

Michael Møller Michael Møller (born 9 November 1952) is president of the Diplomatic Forum of the Geneva Science and Diplomacy Anticipator Foundation, principal advisor at Macro Advisory Partners and member of the boards of several foundations, including the Kof ...

* Wendell Wallach * Aimee Van Wynsberghe *

Tedros Adhanom Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (, sometimes spelled ; born 3 March 1965) is an Ethiopian public health official, researcher, diplomat, and the Director-General of the World Health Organization since 2017. He is the first African to become WHO Dire ...

Mukhisa Kituyi Dr. Mukhisa Kituyi (born October 20, 1956) is a Kenyan politician who served as Secretary-General of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, UNCTAD from September 2013 to February 2021 when he stepped down to run for the Kenyan P ...

Bill Peduto William Mark Peduto (born October 30, 1964) is an American politician who was the 60th mayor of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania from 2014 until 2022. He was a Democratic member of the Pittsburgh City Council from 2002 to 2014. Before his election to ...

* Stuart J. Russell *

Thomas Wiegand Thomas Wiegand (born 6 May 1970 in Wismar) is a German electrical engineer who substantially contributed to the creation of the H.264/AVC, H.265/HEVC, and H.266/VVC video coding standards. He has been elected to the German National Academy of ...

Timnit Gebru Timnit Gebru (Amharic and ; 1982/1983) is an Eritrean Ethiopian-born computer scientist who works in the fields of artificial intelligence (AI), algorithmic bias and data mining. She is a co-founder of Black in AI, an advocacy group that has pu ...

Huw Price Huw Price (; born 17 May 1953) is an Australian philosopher, formerly the Bertrand Russell Professor in the Faculty of Philosophy, Cambridge, and a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. He was previously Challis Professor of Philosophy and D ...

* Stephen Kelly * H.E. Ahmed Al Theneyan * U.N. Envoy on Youth Jayathma Wickramanayake *

Ingmar Weber Ingmar Weber is a German computer scientist known for his research on Computational Social Science in which he uses online data to study population behavior. He was the Research Director for Social Computing at the Qatar Computing Research Institu ...

* Lui Yang

Global summit 2019

The third AI for Good Global Summit took place from 28 May to 31 May, and gave rise to the

ITU Focus Group on Artificial Intelligence for Autonomous and Assisted Driving The International Telecommunication Union (ITU)In the other common languages of the ITU: * * is a specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for many matters related to information and communication technologies. It was established ...

with several Day 0 workshops and VIP events having taken place on May 27. Some of the speakers included: *

Ray Kurzweil Raymond Kurzweil ( ; born February 12, 1948) is an American computer scientist, author, entrepreneur, futurist, and inventor. He is involved in fields such as optical character recognition (OCR), speech synthesis, text-to-speech synthesis, spee ...

Cedric Villani Cedric () is a given name invented by Walter Scott in the 1819 novel ''Ivanhoe''. Etymology The invented name is based on '' Cerdic'', the name of a 6th-century Anglo-Saxon king (itself from Brittonic '' Coroticus''). Popularity The name was ...

Yoshua Bengio Yoshua Bengio (born March 5, 1964) is a Canadian-French computer scientist, and a pioneer of artificial neural networks and deep learning. He is a professor at the Université de Montréal and scientific director of the AI institute Montreal In ...

Anousheh Ansari Anousheh Ansari (; ; born September 12, 1966) is an Iranian-American engineer, space tourist, and entrepreneur. She is the co-founder and chairwoman of Prodea Systems, and her previous business accomplishments include serving as co-founder and ch ...

* Yves Daccord *

Vladimir Kramnik Vladimir Borisovich Kramnik (; born 25 June 1975) is a Russian Grandmaster (chess), chess grandmaster. He was the World Chess Champion#Split title (1993–2006), Classical World Chess Champion from 2000 to 2006, and the 14th undisputed World Ch ...

Jim Hagemann Snabe Jim Hagemann Snabe (born October 27, 1965) is a Danish businessman, and the chairman of Siemens. Together with Bill McDermott, Snabe was co-CEO of the German technology company SAP, before becoming member of the board of directors at SAP. Snabe ...

Klaus-Robert Müller Klaus-Robert Müller (born 1964 in Karlsruhe, West Germany) is a German computer scientist and physicist, most noted for his work in machine learning and brain–computer interfaces. Career Klaus-Robert Müller received his Diplom in mathematic ...

* Jean-Philippe Courtois * Amir Ansari * Francis Gury *

Petteri Taalas Jukka Petteri Taalas (born 3 July 1961 in Helsinki, Finland) is a Finnish meteorologist and former Secretary-general of the World Meteorological Organization. Appointed in 2015 by the World Meteorological Congress, the supreme body of the Organi ...

Houlin Zhao Houlin Zhao (; born 7 March 1950) is a Chinese engineer who served as the Secretary-General of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) from 2015 to 2022. He was first elected at the 2014 Plenipotentiary Conference in Busan, and re-elect ...

Soumya Swaminathan Soumya Swaminathan (born 2 May 1959) is an Indian paediatrician and clinical scientist known for her research on tuberculosis and HIV. Swaminathan served as Secretary to the Government of India for Health Research and Director General of the In ...

Eileen Donahoe Eileen Chamberlain Donahoe is a human rights activist and former U.S. diplomat who recently served as U.S. Special Envoy and Coordinator for Digital Freedom at the Department of State. Previously, she served as U.S. Ambassador to the United Natio ...

* Vicki Hanson *

Francesca Rossi Francesca Rossi (born December 7, 1962) is an Italian computer scientist, currently working at the IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center (New York, USA) as an IBM Fellow and the IBM AI Ethics Global Leader. Education and career Francesca Rossi re ...

* Jean-Philippe Courtois

2020, 2022

In 2020 the Global Summit was an online-only event. In 2022, the summit moved to the "Neural Network" community platform. Speakers included: *

Muhammad Yunus Muhammad Yunus (born 28 June 1940) is a Bangladeshi economist, entrepreneur, and civil society leader who has been serving as the Chief Adviser of Bangladesh, Chief Adviser of the Interim government of Muhammad Yunus, interim Yunus ministry, g ...

* Shwetak Patel *

Peter Heine Nielsen Peter Heine Nielsen (born 24 May 1973) is a Danish chess trainer and player. He was awarded the title of Grandmaster by FIDE in 1994. He has won a record nine consecutive World Chess Championship titles as a coach, working with Viswanathan Ana ...

* Reeps One *

Riane Eisler Riane Tennenhaus Eisler (born July 22, 1931) is an Austrian-born American systems scientist, futurist, attorney, and author who writes about the effect of gender and family politics historically on societies, and vice versa. She is best known ...

Kai-Fu Lee Kai-Fu Lee (; born December 3, 1961) is a Taiwanese businessman, computer scientist, investor, and writer. He is currently based in Beijing, China. Lee has worked as an executive, first at Apple, then SGI, Microsoft, and Google. He became the ...

* Regina Barzilay *

* Stephen Ibaraki *

Nuria Oliver Nuria Oliver is a computer scientist. She is the director of the ELLIS Alicante Foundation, Chief Data Scientist at DataPop Alliance, and president of the board of trustees of UNED. Previously, she was an independent director on the board of d ...

* Barbara Pernici *

Taryn Southern Taryn Southern is an American public speaker, artist, and brand strategist who works with emerging technologies. She was formerly known for her work as a TV host, actress and YouTuber. Early life Southern grew up in Wichita, Kansas and landed her ...

* Thomas G. Dietterich * Simon Pierro * Gabriele Kotsis *

Emmanuel Faber Emmanuel Faber (born 22 January 1964) is a French businessman. He was formerly the Chief Executive Officer of Danone, and the Chairman of the Board of directors. He was subsequently appointed Chair of the International Sustainability Standards Bo ...

Mikko Hyppönen Mikko Hyppönen (; born 13 October 1969) is a Finnish computer security expert, speaker and author. He is known for the Hyppönen Law of IoT security, which states that whenever an appliance is described as being "smart", it is vulnerable. He wo ...

* Davar Ardalan *

Iker Casillas Iker Casillas Fernández (; born 20 May 1981) is a Spanish former professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper and currently works as a football commentator. Popularly dubbed "''San Iker''" ("Saint Iker") for his ability to produce miracu ...

* Missy Cummings *

Jaan Tallinn Jaan Tallinn (born 14 February 1972) is an Estonian computer programmer and investor known for his participation in the development of Skype and file-sharing application FastTrack/Kazaa. Recognized as a prominent figure in the field of artificia ...

* Anja Kaspersen * Caroline Criado-Perez * Stuart J. Russell *

Chaesub Lee Chaesub Lee PhD ( Korean: 이재섭) is a telecommunication executive who served as the Director of ITU Telecommunication Standardization Bureau, the permanent secretariat of the International Telecommunication Union Telecommunication Standardiza ...

Peter Diamandis Peter H. Diamandis ( ; born May 20, 1961) is an American engineer, physician, and entrepreneur. He is best known as the founder and chairman of the XPRIZE Foundation, and the cofounder and executive chairman of Singularity University. He is ...

* Simao Campos

Global Summit 2023

The 2023 AI for Good Global Summit took place on 6 – 7 July in Geneva. The event brought together participants, including government officials, policymakers, industry leaders, academics, scientists, technology innovators, civil society members, and representatives from the UN community. The summit received some publicity due to the large gathering of humanoid robots that occurred, including

Ai-Da Ai-Da is an artificial intelligence robot that makes drawings, paintings, and sculptures. Completed in 2019, Ai-Da is described by its creator as "the world's first ultra-realistic humanoid robot" artist. It is named after Ada Lovelace. The robo ...

Nadine Social Robot Nadine is a gynoid humanoid social robot that is modelled on Professor Nadia Magnenat Thalmann. The robot has a strong human-likeness with a natural-looking skin and hair and realistic hands. Nadine is a socially intelligent robot which returns ...

, Geminoid, and Sophia. *

Doreen Bogdan-Martin Doreen Bogdan-Martin (born 1966) is an international civil servant and current Secretary-General of the International Telecommunication Union. She was elected at the 2022 ITU Plenipotentiary Conference in Bucharest, and as the first woman in the ...

Tomas Lamanauskas Tomas Lamanauskas (Lithuania) is the Deputy Secretary-General of the International Telecommunication Union. Lamanauskas was elected for the term 2023–2026 at the ITU Plenipotentiary Conference 2022 (PP-22). Education Lamanauskas obtained a Ma ...

Seizo Onoe Seizo Onoe, a Japanese telecommunication executive, is the Director of the Telecommunication Standardization Bureau of the International Telecommunication Union, the Secretariat of ITU-T. Onoe was elected to the post of Director of the TSB for the ...

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (, sometimes spelled ; born 3 March 1965) is an Ethiopian public health official, researcher, diplomat, and the DGWHO, Director-General of the World Health Organization since 2017. He is the first African to become W ...

* Amandeep Singh Gill * Lila Ibrahim *

Werner Vogels Werner Hans Peter Vogels (born 3 October 1958) is the chief technology officer and vice president of Amazon in charge of driving technology innovation within the company. Vogels has broad internal and external responsibilities. Early life and ...

Yuval Noah Harari Yuval Noah Harari ( ; born 1976) is an Israeli medievalist, military historian, public intellectual, and popular science writer. He currently serves as professor in the Department of History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. His first bestse ...

* Stuart Russell * Orly Lobel *

Maja Matarić Maja Matarić is an American computer scientist, roboticist and AI researcher, and the Chan Soon-Shiong Distinguished Professor of Computer Science, Neuroscience, and Pediatrics at the University of Southern California. She is known for her wo ...

* Wendel Wallach * Alessandra Sala *

* Nicholas Thompson * Bernard Maissen * Babak Hodjat * Ebtesam Almazrouei *

Moriba Jah Moriba Kemessia Jah CorrFRSE (born 1971) is an American space scientist and aerospace engineer who describes himself as a "space environmentalist". Jah is adamant finding solution to the accumulating garbage in space. He specializes in orbit de ...

* Baroness Joanna Shields * Juan Lavista Ferres * H.E. Mr. Jürg Lauber * Najat Mokhtar * Hans Keirstead * LJ Rich *

Anne Neuberger Anne Neuberger (born 1976) is an American national security official who served as the deputy national security advisor for cyber and emerging technology in the Biden administration. Prior to that role, she served for over a decade at the NSA, as ...

Global summit 2024

The 2024 AI for Good Global Summit was held in Geneva on May 30 – 31. The event was attended by leaders from governments, industries, and academia, alongside 10,000 online participants. Highlights included the launch of a unified framework for AI standards by ITU, the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), addressing issues like AI watermarking and deepfake detection, and over 400 UN-led AI projects. The Summit also introduced the AI for Good Impact Initiative, aiming to scale AI solutions globally and foster regional engagement through competitions, accelerators, and policy guidance. Demonstrations showcased innovations, including generative AI and mind-controlled robotic prosthetics. *

* Bilel Jamoussi *

Geoffrey Hinton Geoffrey Everest Hinton (born 1947) is a British-Canadian computer scientist, cognitive scientist, and cognitive psychologist known for his work on artificial neural networks, which earned him the title "the Godfather of AI". Hinton is Univer ...

Sam Altman Samuel Harris Altman (born April 22, 1985) is an American technology entrepreneur, investor, and the chief executive officer of OpenAI since 2019 (he was Removal of Sam Altman from OpenAI, briefly dismissed and reinstated in November 2023). He ...

* HRH Princess Beatrice * Stuart Russell *

Tristan Harris Tristan Harris (; born 1983/1984) is an American technology ethicist. He is the executive director and co-founder of the Center for Humane Technology. Harris has appeared in the Netflix documentary ''The Social Dilemma''. The film features Harris ...

Tshilidzi Marwala Tshilidzi Marwala (born 28 July 1971) is a South African artificial intelligence engineer, a computer scientist, a mechanical engineer and a university administrator. He is currently Rector (academia), Rector of the United Nations University ...

* Azeem Azhar *

Daren Tang Daren Tang Heng Shim ( zh, 邓鸿森; born 1972) is the fifth and current Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). He is also Secretary-General of the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plan ...

Virginia Dignum Maria Virgínia Ferreira de Almeida Júdice Gamito Dignum (born 2 May 1964, in Lisbon, Portugal) is a Professor of Computer Science at Umeå University, and an Associated Professor at Delft University of Technology. She leads the Social and Ethica ...

* Nicholas Thompson * Alexandre Fasel * Chieko Asakawa *

Gita Gopinath Gita Gopinath (born 8 December 1971) is an Indian-American economist who has served as the first deputy managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), since 21 January 2022. She had previously served as chief economist of the IMF ...

* Jim Zemlin * Ebtesam Almazrouei * Anja Kaspersen * Baroness Joanna Shields * Alessandra Sala * Sage Lenier * Pelonomi Moiloa * Anna Koivuniemi * LJ Rich * Le Lu

Outcomes

Machine Learning 5G

The ITU-T Focus Group on Machine Learning for 5G Networks (FG-ML5G) was created following discussions at the 2017 AI for Good Global Summit. The FG-ML5G is produced several technology standards in this domain, including

Y.3172 Y.3172 is an ITU-T Recommendation specifying an architecture for machine learning in future networks including 5G (IMT-2020). The architecture describes a machine learning pipeline in the context of telecommunication networks that involves the t ...

Y.3173 Y.3173 is an ITU-T Recommendation building upon Y.3172 Y.3172 is an ITU-T Recommendation specifying an architecture for machine learning in future networks including 5G (IMT-2020). The architecture describes a machine learning pipeline in the ...

Y.3176 Y.3176 is an ITU-T The International Telecommunication Union Telecommunication Standardization Sector (ITU-T) is one of the three Sectors (branches) of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). It is responsible for coordinating Standar ...

, which were adopted by

ITU-T Study Group 13 The ITU-T Study Group 13 (SG13) is a statutory group of the ITU Telecommunication Standardization Sector (ITU-T) concerned with future networks and emerging network technologies, infrastructure and cloud computing, including the networking aspe ...

. The FG-ML5G created the impetus for a new ITU-T Focus Group on Autonomous Networks, which is responsible for i.a. Y.3181.

AI for Health

The 2018 Global Summit led to the creation of the ITU-WHO Focus Group on Artificial Intelligence for Health with the

World Health Organization The World Health Organization (WHO) is a list of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations which coordinates responses to international public health issues and emergencies. It is headquartered in Gen ...

, which created the AI for Health Framework.

ITU Journal "ICT Discoveries"

The ITU relaunched its Journal ICT Discoveries during the 2018 Global Summit, with the first edition being a special on Artificial Intelligence.

Criticism

Payal Arora criticized AI for Good for its

paternalism Paternalism is action that limits a person's or group's liberty or autonomy against their will and is intended to promote their own good. It has been defended in a variety of contexts as a means of protecting individuals from significant harm, s ...

towards the

Global South Global North and Global South are terms that denote a method of grouping countries based on their defining characteristics with regard to socioeconomics and politics. According to UN Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the Global South broadly com ...

References

External links

* {{Official website, aiforgood.itu.int Recurring events established in 2017 Recurring events established in 2020 Technology conferences Business conferences Artificial intelligence conferences United Nations conferences Switzerland and the United Nations