French president urges transparency for social media algorithms

BRUSSELS

French President Emmanuel Macron urged greater transparency Wednesday for social media algorithms, emphasizing their effect on children, teens and democratic processes, the BFMTV broadcaster reported.

Macron highlighted the need for algorithmic clarity from tech companies and underscored France's vision for responsible artificial intelligence, during the inauguration of the Franco-Indian Center for Artificial Intelligence in Health in New Delhi.

"It's clear that in the system today, something is rotten. And look at the situation of our children, our teenagers. When you speak about social media. If you add to this social media, some chatbox with adjunct capacities, I mean, this is the beginning of a terrible situation," he said.

Macron urged "hyper-scalers," or major technology companies, to provide full transparency on their algorithms, stressing the importance of understanding how they are designed, tested and trained.

"Democratic consequences of this bias could be huge. We don't ask for regulation ... just should make it transparent. You are for the free speech. Some of them claim to be favor of free speech. Okay, we are in favor of free algorithm," said Macron. "Because, I mean, free speech is a pure bull**** if nobody knows how you are guided through this so-called free speech.”

Macron also promoted France as a study destination, reiterating his goal of tripling the number of Indian students in France to 30,000 by 2030.