7NEWS Spotlight on Channel 7 and 7plus S2025E9 profiling AI – Slaves to AI: a 7NEWS Spotlight world exclusive. The Australian company using hidden workers to train AI
We ask artificial intelligence to write our resumes, plan our holidays, even help diagnose disease. But what if the intelligence behind it wasn’t artificial at all, and it all comes at a terrible human cost?
This Sunday at 8.45pm on Seven and 7plus, 7NEWS Spotlight travels to Kenya, the US and Colombia to uncover the human face of AI – and the major role an Australian company is playing in it.
In this exclusive investigation, reporter Michael Usher tracks down the people behind the algorithms – the so-called “ghost workers” of AI. These are the invisible people labelling data, moderating content and training the systems that now shape our everyday lives.
Many of the ghost workers are paid just cents per task. Some are exposed to disturbing material. Others are asked to submit hundreds of personal images of their children – all in the name of progress.
“If you say artificial intelligence, I’ll say you can please correct that and say ‘African intelligence’,”
– says Michael, a Kenyan father.
“Because most of this work has been done here in Africa.”
“They asked me to describe what human flesh might taste like,”
– says worker Chychy.
“You have to put yourself in the mindset of a cannibal to earn $12.”
“I was watching pornography eight hours a day. And I did that for eight good months,”
– says another worker.
“The things I saw, I would never even want to talk about.”
These data labellers aren’t employed by the tech giants directly; they are hired through layers of outsourcing and a digital supply chain designed to keep them invisible. And one of the key players is an Australian company with global reach and serious questions to answer.
Michael Usher said:
“AI is being built on the backs of people you’ve never heard of, doing work you were never meant to see. They’re not just training machines. They’re absorbing trauma, surrendering privacy, and being paid in cents – if they’re paid at all.
“What we’ve uncovered is a system that’s as exploitative as it is sophisticated. These tech giants, including an Australian company, are indirectly using thousands of workers, to the benefit of their great AI arms race.”
7NEWS Spotlight: Slaves to AI – This Sunday at 8.45pm on Seven and 7plus
Media Release – Seven
TV Central Seven content HERE
7NEWS Spotlight on Channel 7 and 7plus S2025E9 profiling AI
