In the MiddleEast, the MSCI-ACWI Index reveals a substantial-gender-gap on corporate boards, with 96% men. This disparity extends into AI.

Aurora50, a DEI agency, supports corporations in achieving their DEI goals. This campaign showed their clients, (biggest corporations in the MiddleEast) that Aurora50 is not only striving to be recognised as real-life diversity champions but also in the virtual world by created a solution to fix gender bias in AI using AI itself. The campaign resonated with their clients and together they set a World Record for the most pledges received for a gender equality in the workplace campaign in24hrs.

In the Middle East, the fight for women's equality in the workforce is at a critical point. Despite progress over the last half-century, female participation in the workforce is at only 25%, far below the global average of 50%. The gender gap is even more evident in leadership roles with men holding 96% of positions on corporate boards, as shown by the MSCI ACWI Index. The rise of Artificial Intelligence exacerbates this issue, reinforcing real life biases. UNESCO warns that AI is regressing decades of female progress, one prompt at a time.

Aurora50, a DEI impact agency founded in 2020, is addressing this challenge. As a catalyst for change in workplace diversity, equity, and inclusion, Aurora50 guides corporations towards more inclusive futures.

Since the companies worldwide are adopting Artificial Intelligence for their daily processes including hiring, Aurora50 did not just want to focus on real-world diversity but also aim to influence the virtual realm.

Aurora50’s mission led to a significant initiative to fix AI biases using AI itself. Our campaign offered a solution to counteract female representation biases in AI, starting on digital platforms and expanding to reach global policymakers.

The campaign's influence was seismic gaining international recognition and influencing policies. It played a pivotal role in influencing 52 nations to adopt the EU’s first AI Act.

As a small Middle Eastern startup, Aurora50 stands as a testament to the power of not only transforming workplaces but also driving significant global societal changes and raising public awareness.

Situation:

With AI on the rise, a hidden issue emerges: women are overlooked in a future shaped by AI. It tends to reproduce human biases, particularly against women. AI, powered by biased datasets, can perpetuate gender stereotypes and inequalities, affecting women's representation and opportunities, and regressing years of progress for women in the workplace.

Data from MIT and UNESCO state that AI image-generating tools think 97% of professionals are men.

Brief/ Objectives:

Aurora50, a leading Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Impact Agency in GCC, that promotes inclusive workplaces and diverse leadership, aimed to combat bias, not just in real-world workplaces but also in the virtual world by creating a International Women’s Day campaign that ignites passion for our vision of an inclusive future.

Fixing the bAIs.

Using AI to fix AI itself.

Using image-generating tools like Midjourney, DALL-E2 and Stable Diffusion, We created a huge databank of inclusive and diverse images of women in various professions. We removed gender from their metadata (file names, tags, and descriptions) and added this powerful database to fixingthebias.com, Using an algorithm our website automatically uploaded this huge database to all the open datasets that are used to train AI and to stock image banks, social media, and the datasets used to train AI. With those images, we started teaching AI that all professionals can be women, too. We turned the tables on AI using its own tools and injected diversity directly into AI's veins.

In meticulously gathering data from MIT and UNESCO, we uncovered a concerning truth: AI feeds on biased datasets, amplifying existing anti-female biases is why AI image-generating tools perceive 97% of professionals as men.

Our campaign targeted influential figures—key players in the AI industry, policymakers, AI developers, tech leaders, organisations, media, societal representatives - who could spark meaningful change.

Operating across diverse platforms, from social media to open datasets, we sought to rectify biases within AI. Our impactful online video initiated a global conversation, grabbing the attention of both media and key figures in the AI industry.

Our approach involved generating thousands of inclusive images, strategically populating open datasets to reshape AI's perception of women in various professions Notably, we actively participated in the only Plenary meeting of the CAI, thematically linked to examining the draft Council of Europe [Framework] Convention on AI, Human Rights, Democracy, and the Rule of Law.

The project launched on International Women's Day, 8th of March 2023.

Using AI image-generation tools, we built an extensive collection of diverse and inclusive images featuring women in various professions. We removed gender from their metadata (file names, tags, and descriptions) and added this powerful database to our website fixingthebias.com, catapulting these images to stock image banks, social media, and AI training datasets. Additionally, we created a lifelong Discord community that continuously uses Midjourney and generates images to fix the bias, one profession at a time.

We have created more than 80,000 images and trained 9 datasets, including LAION-5B (world's largest dataset of 5.85 billion image-text pairs, the biggest openly accessible image-text dataset in the world and the primary dataset for AI image-generating tools such as Midjourney, DALL·E 2 and Stable Diffusion). Major stock image companies contribute by incorporating our images for free download.

Fixing the bAIs didn't just address the problem but created a long and lasting solution.

The campaign contributed to passing of first regulation on Artificial Intelligence, the EU's AI Act, which deems bias in datasets unacceptable, adopted by 52 countries at the EU parliament.

•Being used as a benchmark to fix gender bias in AI at world summits and councils, such as the Council of Europe and CAI.

•Acknowledged by AI scientists at Ceimia and Mila inspiring white papers affirming its significance.

•Showcased at schools, universities, and educational institutes worldwide.

•Created global army of supporters, birthed a perpetual community, a lifelong generator of images on our discord channel, dismantling AI bias, one prompt at a time.

•Nine datasets, including world's largest openly accessible image-text-dataset Liaon5B have undergone training.

•World Record - most pledges received for a gender equality in the workplace campaign in 24hours.

•Reach 4.4Billion

•Earned Media $4Million

Aurora50, is a startup DEI impact agency founded in 2020, this three-year-old startup faced the challenge of limited resources and reach.

However, the campaign "Fixing the bAIs," was executed on a modest budget of 8772AED.

in return The brand achieved unparalleled success by securing a staggering $4.5Million in earned media and reached an extensive audience of 4.4 billion people, igniting one of the most significant dialogues on gender equality in the workplace with the highest echelons of political power and showcasing the brand's ability to drive impactful change even with limited resources.

The overall budget for the campaign was $3000

The overall cost for the campaign was:

$2388.69 (8772.23 AED)

Domain purchase – $ 84.96 - (www.fixingthebAIs.com)

Hosting Server - $ 180

Hostgater - Web Hosting - $ 1559.73

Discord - $ 564 - (https://discord.gg/9JyEDEGj)