Google was set to help develop an artificial intelligence program to help military drone strikes reduce the number of civilian casualties — that is, until 12 employees resigned from the company in protest and another 3,000 signed an open letter blasting the program as evil.

Google had an employee meeting to discuss whether AI should be used in the military, The New York Times reported on May 30.

Diane Greene, CEO of Google Cloud, announced the decision on Friday at an employee meeting, according to Gizmodo. There is a current contract with the Pentagon that expires in 2019, but it will not be renewed.

Drone strikes have had varying degrees of accuracy and have left some civilians dead in the wake of their attacks.

The project with the Pentagon, called Project Maven, aimed to implement the AI technology to pinpoint and determine what particular objects are in drone footage, thereby increasing the accuracy of the drone strikes, The Daily Caller News Foundation reported on March 6.

The are some criticisms of AI being used in the military, and outspoken critics like Elon Musk speculate that AI in general is itself an existential threat to humanity. – READ MORE