China will soon be able to topple down explicit, violent and pornographic contents seen online. This is the vision of a Chinese start-up that uses artificial intelligence (AI) to help the complex World Wide Web to take down such contents. But what makes this methodology different from existing AI tools to go after these morally detrimental elements of the internet?
Tuputech, a three-year-old Guangzhou-based AI company, offers thorough filtering of online photos using its advanced deep learning and AI technology. The company claims to have reviewed more than 100 billion photos as of October since January and 900 million photos every day on the average.
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Mingqiang Li, the founder of Tuputech, tells SCMP in an interview that his company uses a technology that "acts fast to detect inappropriate content".
"By providing real-time image recognition for social media, live broadcasting and video and photo-sharing sites...we can help companies to identify, tag and filter objectionable images – pornographic, violent or otherwise explicit or inappropriate," says Li.
Since recently, the company has been pushing its service globally amidst the announcement of the Chinese government to develop a local AI industry worth US$150bn and to make China an "innovative centre for AI" by the year 2030. Tuputech has secured already a total of US$10m in funding.
Some of Tuputech's reputable clientele include China Mobile Communications, live streaming firm Inke, video-streaming app Meipai, Musical.ly, Live.me and Viva Video, among many others.
China's stringent crackdown on explicit, violent and pornographic content has been heightened recently. In the past few months, the government had imposed incredibly huge monetary penalties on search giant Baidu and social media Weibo for failing to regulate their platforms from such contents.
