The Canadian government will soon hire an Ottawa-based company specializing in social media monitoring and artificial intelligence to forecast spikes in suicide rates. Advanced Symbolics' chief scientist, Kenton White, uses online artificial intelligence technology to predict real-life events, including elections and consumer trends. (Advanced Symbolics)Many phone surveys poll roughly 1,500 people, but Advanced Symbolics said its representative sample of Canada's population uses more than 160,000 social media accounts. "We create representative samples of populations on social media, and we observe their behaviour without disturbing it." According to Advanced Symbolics, artificial intelligence could offer a two- to three-month warning before a spike in suicides occurs.

Source: CBC News January 02, 2018 10:52 UTC