Chris Wexler's Quest to Detoxify the Internet: AI and Krunam's Fight to Stop Human Trafficking
In this episode, I sit down with Chris Wexler, the CEO of Krunam, one of the world’s leading image and video classifiers of Child Sexual Abuse Materials (CSAM). We discuss the dark side of the world wide web, and Chris explains how exploitative economies of human trafficking proliferate online. We discuss how Krunam puts AI to use combatting this exploitation. We also look at the rise of social justice-oriented technologies and the rise of social impact investing, and Chris shares why he is hopeful that the future of tech investing will be social-impact based.
Krunam has created one of the most potent AI tools for successfully identifying and removing digital toxic waste from the internet. By using AI to identify CSAM and other incendiary and exploitative content to improve and speed content moderation, Krunam’s technology has helped private platforms and law enforcement halt some of the most exploitative child sex trafficking outfits operating today.
Before founding Krunam, Chris established several leading digital and analytics practices at four different major ad agencies while working with major brands. He now devotes his time to creating safer digital environments and developing social impact technology to better serve human values and social justice.
*A brief content warning note about today’s episode: my interview with Chris discusses using AI to classify images containing child sexual content. The work is important, but the discussion includes frank conversations about sexual material and is not suitable for all ears. Please consider your surroundings before listening, and you may want to avoid listening in a space that you share with children.
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This episode was produced by Matt Perry.
Art by Desi Aleman.