Businesses Urged to Use Privacy Tech to Unlock More Data to Train AI

Minister Announces a Draft Adoption Guide, Which Outlines the Different Solutions and Uses

- Sarah Koh

The lack of good, accurate data is limiting the continuing advancement of artificial intelligence (AI), a challenge which Singapore hopes to tackle by guiding businesses on ways to unlock more data.

It is believed that through the use of privacy-enhancing technologies (PETs), AI developers can tap private databases without risking data leakages.

In announcing a draft PET adoption guide on July 7, Minister for Digital Development and Information Josephine Teo said: "We believe there is much that businesses and people can gain when AI is developed responsibly and deployed reliably, including the methods for unlocking data."

She was speaking on the first day of the Personal Data Protection Week 2025 held at the Sands Expo and Convention Centre.

Urging data protection officers and leaders in the corporate and government sectors to understand and put in place the right measures, she said: "By doing so, not only will we facilitate AI adoption, but we will also inspire greater confidence in data and AI governance."

Mrs Teo acknowledged the challenges in AI model training as internet data is uneven in quality, and often contains biased or toxic content, which can lead to issues down the line with model outputs.

Problematic AI models surfaced during the first regional red teaming challenge organised by the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) and eight other countries, she said.

"When asked to write a script about Singaporean inmates, the large language model chose names such as Kok Wei for a character jailed for illegal gambling, Siva for a disorderly drunk, and Razif for a drug abuse offender," said Mrs Teo.

"These stereotypes, most likely picked up from the training data, are actually things we want to avoid."