TikTok owner ByteDance's AI project was disrupted massively by an intern. And then, this happened
ByteDance, which owns TikTok, has been unveiling several AI applications
ByteDance has terminated the services of an intern for interference with an AI model project, which reportedly caused tens of millions dollars' worth of damages, a claim denied by the Chinese owner of massively popular video-sharing platform TikTok.
The firing took place in August, according to a clarification issued by ByteDance after Chinese mainland social media was abuzz with how massive a dent the intern's actions had made on the company's finances.
In a statement posted on its news aggregation platform Toutiao on Saturday (Oct 19), ByteDance described as 'inaccurate' the reports of any significant damage or revenue losses for the company arising from the intern's actions.
The intern in question was part of ByteDance advertising tech department's commercialisation wing.
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Reportedly dissatisfied with resource allocations, the intern disrupted AI model training involving over 8,000 GPUs or GraphicsProcessing Units.
ByteDance, which in addition to TikTok is developing several AI applications, said the company's official commercial projects and AI operations were not disrupted.
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It said industry associations and the university of the intern were informed about the misconduct. The intern studied in Beihang University and Peking University, according to a report in South China Morning Post.
Countering claims in social media, ByteDance said the intern did not have experience with its AI lab.
The company's clarifications came even an audio recording claiming to be from the intern surfaced on the global code depository site GitHub.
The audio from the handle 'JusticeFighter110' posted on October 18 claimed the intern inserted malicious code into the AI project. But another repository on GitHub said the audio was fabricated.
TikTok cuts hundreds of jobs as ByteDance shifts focus to AI content moderation
According to the SCMP report,the intern had previosly worked at SenseTime and the Oxford University before startingat ByteDance in 2021.
Figting in generative AI world against big players like OpenAI, ByteDance's AI lab is bringing out several features and applications driven by artificial intellicence.
Its Doubao AI model reached 47 monthly active users in September as opposed to Baidu’s Ernie Bot or Wenxiaoyan which had 12 mn and Moonshot AI’s Kimi, which had had 7 mn users.
(With inputs from agencies)
