ASTANA – While the rapid spread of AI can ease our daily and professional lives, this also bears a number of risks, such as rising inequality, job losses, and security issues.
Photo credit: KPMG.
AI expert Dariya Smailova shared her views on AI development and how it can be implied in Kazakhstan in an interview with The Astana Times.
Dariya Smailova, an AI and Marketing expert with experience in Google, explained that artificial intelligence (AI) includes several terms, and concepts such as machine learning, natural language analysis, and AI algorithms.
When asked about opportunities given by AI, Smailova noted that AI can ease daily tasks and increase efficiency and productivity “You can respond faster to emails, and you can write some texts very quickly, which saves time and resources for other tasks,” explained Smailova.
Dariya Smailova. Photo credit: Smailova’s personal archive.
Smailova mentioned that AI can also help in making decisions and creating new products by analyzing big data and showing patterns and trends. AI is used for self-driving vehicles, and virtual assistants and is also widely used in medicine.
However, along with the opportunities AI development bears a number of risks.
“For example, next year Bard (an AI tool developed by Google) will release the second version of its product featuring a photo and video editor. So the work of video editors is changing. Call centers are also under threat,” explained Smailova.
According to her, a number of other professions are also in the risk zone.
“Cashiers – there are automatic racks everywhere that weigh, count, make returns… Executive assistants helping to keep a diary, drivers, assembly line workers, accountants, legal clerks, video editors,” added Smailova.
She believes that the work of programmers, data analysts, and marketers will also change.
Talking about inequality risk due to the spread of AI, she explained that educated people using AI tools get rich, while uneducated people are left behind.
“AI is useful in good hands, while in bad hands it can harm… Digital hygiene should become the number one topic. AI does not want to sleep, does not want to eat – it can pick up your passwords. So now you need to think about changing the passwords on all mail,” said Smailova.
Smailova noted that AI doesn’t have intuition and judgment, and can’t plan. Meanwhile, in her view, AI applications should be stopped in creative industries.
“There’s a big Writers Guild of America strike in Los Angeles right now because scripts written by AI are sometimes a lot more exciting than people can write,” said Smailova.
However, AI will transform professions in creative industries.
“Writing posts, choosing pictures – this can be done by AI. But at the same time, you need a person – his taste, intuition, his common sense, his experience. So in the next five years, these professions will remain, but they will change,” she added.
Smailova believes that AI has a big potential for use in many industries in Kazakhstan.
For example, in healthcare AI can be used for filling out patients’ cards.
“Nothing will need to be printed long, all this can be done with the help of AI,” said Smailova.
Diagnostics can be done faster. “AI can collect all the tests and give out a diagnosis at once,” she added.
In her view, AI can be used in transport since AI cars are safer than usual ones according to many tests.
She added that AI can be used in cyber-security, combating crime, and jurisprudence. “Travel agencies in Kazakhstan can also use AI” added Smailova.
