House Communications Subcommittee Witnesses Disagree on AI for Broadband Maps

Experts disagreed on the potential for artificial intelligence to aid broadband mapping efforts at a House Communications and Technology Subcommittee hearing. Courtney Lang, a vice president at tech industry trade group ITI, said AI could be used to improve the quality of current broadband maps. A machine learning model could do that by using past data to identify buildings that are likely to be accurately marked as having adequate broadband, according to Lang. But Nicol Turner Lee, director of the Brookings Institution’s Center for Technology Innovation, urged caution. “We have to be careful that we might not have enough data,” she said. In rural parts of the country, data can be sparse and low-quality. Both factors would make machine learning ill-suited to the task of flagging potential inaccuracies. She urged lawmakers to exercise restraint when using AI for “critical government functions,” like the broadband maps used to determine where federal grant money will go.