HANGZHOU, China — The transformative power of artificial intelligence is worthless if user data just isn’t protected, George Zhao, CEO of Chinese smartphone company Honor, said in an exclusive interview with CNBC on Thursday.
His comments come like Apple announced this month that it might begin rolling out personalized AI tools on certain devices within the U.S. this fall.
Honor already integrates some AI features. For example, it allows users to open text messages and other notifications just by them, or eliminates copy-and-paste steps by linking Yelp-like apps on to navigation or ride-sharing apps.
This week, Honor presented latest AI tools for Detecting the usage of deepfakes in videosand to simulate lenses that may reduce myopia brought on by long hours of screen time.
Zhao stressed that Honor's approach is to limit AI operations with personal data to the smartphone. This can also be called on-device AI and is in contrast to AI tools that use cloud computing to operate.
“Without data security and user privacy protection, AI becomes worthless,” Zhao said in Mandarin, translated by CNBC. “This has always been one of our value propositions.”
“We say user data does not leave [the device]said Zhao. “This is a principle we adhere to.”
Apple Intelligence, the iPhone maker's AI product, claims it uses on-device processing and relies on “server-based models” for more complex queries. Apple said its new “Private Cloud Compute” never stores user data.
Honor says that the on-device AI was developed in-house and that the company is baidu And Google Cloud for some other AI features.
“Overall, I think that the development of AI so far has gone in two directions,” said Zhao. “Network [cloud] AI has become increasingly more powerful. But I believe that on-device AI will become increasingly intimate and understanding with its capabilities and empowerment of consumers.”
“It will provide more support to consumers and help them interact with the future AI world,” he added.
Zhao pointed out that many generative AI applications, such as OpenAI's ChatGPT, require computing power that goes far beyond the battery capacity of a single smartphone.
This means they have to use the cloud, the raises questions to ensure the security of data transmission.
Balancing AI capabilities, energy consumption and data protection is a “big challenge” for manufacturers, Zhao said.
He said that a system that collects large amounts of user data to provide more personalized features becomes a “more powerful” object compared to the individual using the system.
“In the future development of smartphones, our goal is to empower the individual,” Zhao said.
“As an object becomes more powerful, the smallness of the person in its presence is revealed. I consider that mobile devices must empower and empower the person.”
Honor's Magic V2 foldable phone, which launched in China last summer and in Europe earlier this year, won the “Best Smartphone in Asia” award at the MWC in Shanghai this week.
The Magic V2 folds almost as thin as an iPhone.
Honor will launch the Magic V3 in July with the company's latest AI features.
When asked if the new foldable device would be even thinner, Zhao simply said: “Of course now we have to challenge ourselves, right?”
image credit : www.cnbc.com