IBM will no longer offer general purpose facial recognition or analysis software, IBM CEO Arvind Krishna said in a letter to Congress today. The company will also no longer develop or research the technology, IBM tells The Verge. Krishna addressed the letter to Sens. Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Kamala Harris (D-CA) and Reps. Karen Bass (D-CA), Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), and Jerrold Nadler (D-NY).
In his letter, Krishna also advocated for police reform, arguing that more police misconduct cases should be put under the purview of federal court and that Congress should make changes to qualified immunity doctrine, among other measures. In addition, Krishna said that “we need to create more open and equitable pathways for all Americans to acquire marketable skills and training,” and he suggested Congress consider scaling the P-TECH school model nationally and expanding eligibility for Pell Grants.
The kind of company that Dame Stephanie Shirley wanted to work for didn’t exist in 1962, so she created her own.
“I wanted a company that was suitable for me [and] that I would like to work in,” Shirley said on Nerdette. “And I knew there were lots of women who had also hit the glass ceiling and were completely and utterly ignored by the industry.”
She’s talking about the software industry, which was even more of a boys club at the time. So Shirley founded her own business, Freelance Programmers, and hired a bunch of women from IBM. She even changed her first name from Stephanie to Steve in order to get the attention of potential clients through promotional materials.
“I’d been patronized as a child,” Shirley said. “I wasn’t going to be patronized as an adult.”
Shirley told Nerdette host Greta Johnsen about her incredible life story.