Melihat teknologi AI dan Machine Learning di Apple

Steven Levy, menulis di Backchannel tentang bagaimana teknologi AI dan machine learning bekerja di Apple. Disebut-sebut ketinggalan dengan Google dan Microsoft dalam pengembangan teknologi AI dan machine learning, nyatanya Apple sudah lama menggunakan teknologi machine learning untuk memberikan prediksi serta rekomendasi yang dibutuhkan oleh pengguna perangkatnya. Ya, teknologi tersebut ada di iPhone, iPad dan Mac yang kamu gunakan sekarang ini.

If you’re an iPhone user, you’ve come across Apple’s AI, and not just in Siri’s improved acumen in figuring out what you ask of her. You see it when the phone identifies a caller who isn’t in your contact list (but did email you recently). Or when you swipe on your screen to get a shortlist of the apps that you are most likely to open next. Or when you get a reminder of an appointment that you never got around to putting into your calendar. Or when a map location pops up for the hotel you’ve reserved, before you type it in. Or when the phone points you to where you parked your car, even though you never asked it to. These are all techniques either made possible or greatly enhanced by Apple’s adoption of deep learning and neural nets.

Yes, there is an “Apple brain” — it’s already inside your iPhone.

Mengembangkan teknologi AI dan machine learning yang mengerti kebutuhan pengguna bukan perkara mudah. Dibutuhkan data dengan jumlah yang sangat banyak¹ untuk dapat mengetahui pola penggunaan yang kemudian dapat digunakan untuk memberikan rekomendasi. Tantangan terbesar Apple dalam pengembangan justru datang dari prinsip mereka yang fokus pada keamanan data pengguna.

Probably the biggest issue in Apple’s adoption of machine learning is how the company can succeed while sticking to its principles on user privacy. The company encrypts user information so that no one, not even Apple’s lawyers, can read it (nor can the FBI, even with a warrant). And it boasts about not collecting user information for advertising purposes.

While admirable from a user perspective, Apple’s rigor on this issue has not been helpful in luring top AI talent to the company. “Machine learning experts, all they want is data,” says a former Apple employee now working for an AI-centric company. “But by its privacy stance, Apple basically puts one hand behind your back. You can argue whether it’s the right thing to do or not, but it’s given Apple a reputation for not being real hardcore AI folks.”

Dengan iOS 10, Apple mengenalkan teknologi baru bernama Differential Privacy. Teknologi machine learning yang berusaha menganalisa sebuah pola tanpa menggunakan data-data atau informasi sensitif dari sebuah individu. Seperti yang dijelaskan oleh Craig Federighi:

“We started working on it years ago, and have done really interesting work that is practical at scale,” explains Federighi. “And it’s pretty crazy how private it is.” (He then describes a system that involves virtual coin-tossing and cryptographic protocols that I barely could follow — and I wrote a book about cryptography. Basically it’s about adding mathematical noise to certain pieces of data so that Apple can detect usage patterns without identifying individual users.)

Terkadang inovasi bukan sekedar fitur baru. Prediksi kata yang semakin akurat ketika mengetik, Apps suggestion di Spotlight yang semakin tepat, Siri yang semakin cerdas dan mengerti konteks perintah adalah inovasi juga. Dengan iOS 10 nantinya, setiap perangkat iPhone atau iPad akan semakin pintar berkat bantuan teknologi machine learning. Dikomputasi pada jutaan perangkat yang tersebar di seluruh dunia, bukan server milik Apple.