s PECIAL REPORT
F
u Gui was just six years old when he
was abducted from his hometown
in Chongqing in China’s inland
southwest. As an adult living in coastal Fu-
jian Province, he had only hazy memories of
his childhood, which led him to believe he
might have been one of China’s many stolen
children. He uploaded his photo to Baobei-
huijia.com in 2009, a site that helps reunite
kids and parents.
Eight years later, in January 2017, his fa-
ther and aunt put one of their few photos
of the infant Fu, aged four, on the site. That
March, China search engine giant Baidu be-
gan working with the site, applying its newly
developed cross-age face recognition technol-
ogy. Fu’s photos were among the first to be
matched, and a DNA test confirmed the re-
sults. Fu saw his father’s face for the first time
on a video chat on April 8.
The story was widely covered, and brought
new hope for the more than 20,000 people
seeking their relatives on the site. In March,
Li Yanhong (Robin Li), chairman, co-found-
er and CEO of Baidu, submitted a proposal
to use facial recognition techniques to tackle
child trafficking cases to the annual sessions
of the Chinese People’s Political ConsultativeConference, the national advisory body.
Baidu developed the techniques through
“deep learning,” an algorithm-based com-
puting technique used to “train” machines
in pattern recognition. Like other machine
learning techniques, it allows computers to
perform tasks they haven’t expressly been
programmed for. So far it has proved to be
the most effective means to manage voice
and face recognition. As such, it’s a branch of
artificial intelligence, where computers mim-
ic human’s perceptive, cognitive and analytic
functions. Although computer theorists and
philosophers have widely varying definitions
of the term, “AI” has become a common Sili-
con Valley buzzword, mostly used for such
learning functions. Baidu was one of the first
companies in China to seek to exploit these
new learning functions for itself.All-Star Team
Baidu started as a search engine, becom-
ing dominant in the Chinese market after
Google left the country. The vast majority of
its profits continue to come from advertising
related to the search engine. But Li has re-
peatedly declared that the company will shift
toward being an “AI-first” company from a“mobile-first” one, and said confidently that
it will be a leader in the country’s coming “AI
wave.”
Like other Internet giants including
Google, Baidu is investing heavily in AI re-
search and development. According to Bai-
du’s income statements at Nasdaq, the US
tech stock index, the company spent 13 to
15 percent of its annual revenue on R&DAI in China
deep learning
China’s search giant Baidu is trying to push the envelope
on ‘deep learning’ and other AI techniques. But ethical and
practical concerns haunt the company’s efforts
By Wu Ziru and Li Jia
A representative from Baidu delivers a
brief on Baidu’s artificial intelligence
technology at a conference, Wuzhen,
Zhejiang Province, November 2016