Google denies link to China’s military over touch-screen tools that may help PLA pilots
- Predicting screen touches accurately has many potential uses, but one is to help pilots select a fast-moving target
- Lead scientist in Google’s artificial intelligence team revealed to be taking part in research by Chinese institute
Google has denied contributing expertise to the Chinese military after taking part in research that could be used to sharpen the accuracy of China’s new stealth fighter jet.
A lead scientist from Google took part in research in Beijing with applications that include military, medicine and education, according to China’s largest government science institute.
The research paper, about the development of new computer-human interaction technology, focuses on a smart target-selection assistant that can speed up on-screen mobile target selection by more than 50 per cent and improve accuracy by nearly 80 per cent, the government institute said.
A fighter jet pilot or anti-air missile operator could therefore select fast-moving targets on a touch screen with unprecedented speed and accuracy, according to two mainland researchers informed about the study.
This makes China’s stealth fighter J-20 a candidate to use it, said the two researchers, who declined to be named.