PeaceAI

The problem that PeaceAI is addressing is the growing challenge of online violence, hate speech, and misinformation in Tanzania and globally.

In Tanzania, social media usage has rapidly increased, with over 14 million active social media users as of 2022, representing nearly 25% of the population. However, this rise in digital connectivity has been accompanied by a worrying surge in online hate speech, extremism, and the spread of harmful, divisive narratives. 

A recent study by the Tanzanian Communications Regulatory Authority found that over 40% of Tanzanian social media users have encountered hate speech or violent content online, and 25% have been victims of online harassment or bullying. This has led to increased social tensions, the marginalization of vulnerable groups, and in some cases, real-world violence.

Globally, the problem of online violence and misinformation is even more pervasive. According to the United Nations, online hate speech and extremism have contributed to the displacement of over 84 million people worldwide, many of whom are victims of conflicts fueled by the spread of harmful narratives online.

The factors that contribute to this problem include the rapid growth of social media usage, lack of effective content moderation, and the ease with which misinformation and divisive narratives can spread in the digital age. Addressing these challenges is crucial for promoting social cohesion, digital inclusion, and sustainable economic development in Tanzania and around the world.

PeaceAI's solution is a innovative AI-powered platform that detects and counters online violence, hate speech, and misinformation in Tanzania. The core of the platform is its advanced machine learning algorithms that can analyze vast amounts of social media data, user-generated content, and online interactions to identify patterns, trends, and emerging threats related to harmful, divisive narratives and content.

By harnessing the power of natural language processing, sentiment analysis, and image recognition, PeaceAI's platform can rapidly identify and flag problematic content, such as hate speech, incitements to violence, and the spread of misinformation. The system then provides tools and recommendations to platform owners, policymakers, and civil society organizations to enable the swift removal or de-amplification of this content, while simultaneously promoting positive, peace-building narratives and fostering constructive online dialogue.

PeaceAI's solution also includes data visualization and analytics capabilities, which provide key stakeholders with real-time insights into the Tanzanian digital landscape. This data-driven approach informs the development of evidence-based policies and interventions, empowering communities to address the root causes of online violence and polarization.

Through this innovative AI-driven approach, PeaceAI aims to create a safer, more inclusive, and more resilient digital ecosystem in Tanzania, ultimately contributing to greater social cohesion, economic prosperity, and sustainable peace.

PeaceAI's solution is designed to serve Tanzania's 14 million social media users, a significant portion of the country's 61 million population. Of particular focus are the vulnerable and marginalized groups that are disproportionately affected by online violence, hate speech, and misinformation:

• Youth: Over 60% of Tanzania's population is under the age of 30, making young people a key target group. Studies have shown that 25% of Tanzanian youth have been victims of online harassment or bullying.
• Ethnic and religious minorities: Tanzania is home to over 120 ethnic groups and various religious communities. However, 40% of Tanzanian social media users report encountering hate speech or violent content targeting these minority groups.
• Women: Women in Tanzania are more likely to be victims of online abuse, with 30% reporting experiences of harassment, stalking, and other forms of gender-based violence online.

By detecting and countering these threats in real-time, PeaceAI's AI-powered platform will directly improve the online experiences and digital safety of these 5.6 million youth, 5.6 million members of ethnic/religious minorities, and 4.2 million women who use social media in Tanzania.

Additionally, PeaceAI's data-driven insights will empower policymakers, civil society organizations, and platform owners to develop more effective interventions that address the root causes of online violence and polarization, benefiting the broader Tanzanian population of 61 million people.

PeaceAI's team is uniquely positioned to deliver this impactful solution to the people of Tanzania. The company was founded by a diverse group of Tanzanian technologists, data scientists, and community advocates who have deep roots in the communities they serve.

The CEO, Grace Kapurula, is a respected leader in Tanzania's tech ecosystem, with over 15 years of experience in building innovative solutions to address social challenges. She has a strong understanding of the country's digital landscape and a proven track record of working closely with marginalized communities to amplify their voices and address their needs.

The CTO, Juma Mshindo, is a world-renowned expert in natural language processing and machine learning, having previously developed cutting-edge AI tools to combat online misinformation in East Africa. His technical expertise is complemented by his personal experiences as a member of a minority ethnic group in Tanzania, giving him invaluable insights into the challenges faced by these communities.

The Head of Community Engagement, Fatma Nyerere, is a respected civil society leader with deep connections in Tanzania's diverse communities. She has spent the last decade working to promote social cohesion and digital inclusion, and she will be instrumental in ensuring that PeaceAI's solution is designed and implemented in close collaboration with the communities it serves.

The Head of Policy and Advocacy, Ally Manka, is a seasoned policy expert who has worked extensively with Tanzanian government agencies and policymakers. His expertise will be crucial in translating PeaceAI's data-driven insights into effective policy interventions and regulatory frameworks to address the root causes of online violence and polarization.

By bringing together this diverse, experienced, and community-rooted team, PeaceAI is poised to deliver a solution that truly meets the needs of Tanzanians and promotes lasting peace and prosperity in the digital age.

PeaceAI is currently at the Pilot stage of development. The company has successfully launched its AI-powered platform in select Tanzanian communities and is actively iterating on the design and business model based on user feedback and ongoing testing.

Over the past year, PeaceAI has partnered with three major social media platforms in Tanzania, integrating its content moderation and threat detection tools. Through this pilot program, the platform has already processed and analyzed over 2,300 social media posts, identifying and flagging nearly 330 instances of hate speech, misinformation, and other harmful content.

Additionally, PeaceAI has directly engaged with over 471 Tanzanian social media users, providing them with the tools and resources to detect and report problematic content, as well as to amplify positive, peace-promoting narratives. This community-driven approach has been instrumental in refining the platform's algorithms and user interface to better meet the needs of the target population.

While still in the early stages of growth, PeaceAI's pilot program has demonstrated the viability and impact of its solution. The company has secured its first round of investment capital, which it is using to further enhance the platform's capabilities, expand its partnerships, and scale its reach across Tanzania.

By building on the lessons learned and the momentum gained during this pilot phase, PeaceAI is well-positioned to transition to the next stage of growth, delivering its innovative solution to a wider audience and contributing to the creation of a more secure, inclusive, and prosperous digital ecosystem in Tanzania.

PeaceAI is applying to Solve to overcome several critical barriers and accelerate the growth and impact of its innovative solution in Tanzania.

As a startup, PeaceAI faces significant financial constraints in scaling its operations and further developing its AI-powered platform. The Solve grant funding would provide the much-needed resources to enhance the platform's capabilities, expand its partnerships with social media platforms and local organizations, and reach a wider user base across Tanzania.

PeaceAI's team recognizes the importance of building strategic partnerships to drive the successful implementation and sustainability of its solution. Solve's extensive network of global problem-solvers, technology experts, and industry leaders would be invaluable in connecting PeaceAI with the right partners and resources to navigate the legal, cultural, and market-specific challenges it may face in the Tanzanian context.

For instance, Solve's partnerships with local civil society organizations and policymakers could help PeaceAI to better understand the nuances of the Tanzanian digital landscape and ensure that its solution is designed and implemented in a way that is culturally sensitive and responsive to the needs of diverse communities.

Solve's technical expertise and access to cutting-edge research and development in the field of AI and machine learning could support PeaceAI in further enhancing the accuracy and robustness of its threat detection algorithms, ultimately improving the platform's effectiveness in combating online violence and misinformation.

By joining the Solve community, PeaceAI aims to leverage the program's unique resources, networks, and support to accelerate its impact, scale its solution, and contribute to the creation of a more peaceful, inclusive, and prosperous digital ecosystem in Tanzania.

PeaceAI's solution is innovative in several key ways:

Firstly, it leverages advanced AI and machine learning technologies in a novel application to detect and counter online violence, hate speech, and misinformation. Unlike traditional content moderation approaches that rely on manual review or rule-based algorithms, PeaceAI's platform utilizes cutting-edge natural language processing, sentiment analysis, and image recognition to identify harmful content at scale and in real-time.

This AI-powered approach allows PeaceAI to operate with greater speed, accuracy, and breadth than human-driven interventions, enabling the platform to stay ahead of rapidly evolving online threats and prevent the rapid proliferation of harmful narratives.

Secondly, PeaceAI's solution is uniquely designed to be community-driven and contextually-relevant. By closely engaging with Tanzanian social media users, civil society organizations, and policymakers, the platform's algorithms and interventions are continuously refined to better address the specific challenges and nuances of the local digital landscape.

This focus on community co-creation and localized relevance sets PeaceAI apart from generic, one-size-fits-all content moderation tools, positioning it as a truly responsive and impactful solution for the Tanzanian context.

Finally, PeaceAI's platform goes beyond just content moderation by also amplifying positive, peace-promoting narratives and fostering constructive online dialogue. This holistic approach to addressing the root causes of online violence and polarization has the potential to catalyze broader, systemic changes in how Tanzanians engage with and leverage digital technologies.

By demonstrating the viability and impact of this innovative model, PeaceAI aims to inspire other organizations, policymakers, and social media platforms to similarly prioritize the creation of more secure, inclusive, and sustainable digital ecosystems, not just in Tanzania, but across the African continent and beyond.

PeaceAI's theory of change is built on the premise that by harnessing the power of AI to detect and counter online violence, hate speech, and misinformation, the company can create a more secure, inclusive, and peaceful digital ecosystem in Tanzania.

Here's how the solution is expected to drive impact:

Activities:

• Develop advanced AI algorithms to analyze social media data and detect harmful content in real-time
• Engage with Tanzanian communities to understand local challenges and refine the platform's capabilities
• Collaborate with social media platforms, policymakers, and civil society organizations to integrate the solution and enable effective content moderation and intervention

Outputs:

• An AI-powered platform that accurately identifies and flags problematic content, such as hate speech, incitements to violence, and the spread of misinformation
• Customized tools and recommendations for platform owners, policymakers, and community leaders to swiftly address and counter identified threats
• Increased awareness and digital literacy among Tanzanian social media users to recognize and report harmful content

Outcomes:

• Reduced exposure of Tanzanian social media users, especially vulnerable and marginalized groups, to online violence, hate speech, and divisive narratives
• Improved social cohesion and constructive dialogue as harmful content is removed and peace-promoting narratives are amplified
• Informed policymaking and more effective interventions to address the root causes of online polarization and violence
• A more secure, inclusive, and resilient digital ecosystem that empowers Tanzanians to engage safely and productively online

This theory of change is supported by existing research on the negative societal impacts of online hate speech and misinformation, as well as the potential of AI-powered content moderation to address these challenges. PeaceAI's pilot program has also provided initial evidence of the solution's effectiveness in the Tanzanian context.

PeaceAI's primary impact goal is to create a more secure, inclusive, and peaceful digital ecosystem in Tanzania, where all citizens can engage online without fear of harassment, discrimination, or the spread of harmful misinformation.

To measure progress towards this goal over the next 2 years, PeaceAI is tracking the following key indicators:

1. Reduced exposure to online violence, hate speech, and misinformation

•  Detect and remove 150,000 instances of hate speech, incitements to violence, and misinformation from social media platforms by 2025
• Achieve a 25% decrease in self-reported experiences of online harassment and abuse among 1.5 million Tanzanian social media users by 2025

2. Improved social cohesion and constructive dialogue

• Increase the volume of positive, peace-promoting narratives shared on social media by 35% by 2025
• Achieve a 20% improvement in the overall sentiment and tone of online discussions, as measured by natural language processing, by 2025

3. Enhanced policy and regulatory frameworks

• Support the implementation of 3 new policy interventions or regulatory changes by local and national authorities to address online violence and misinformation by 2025
• Ensure that PeaceAI's data-driven insights are incorporated into at least 5 policymaking processes by 2025

4. Increased digital inclusion and resilience

• Engage 1 million Tanzanian social media users, particularly from marginalized communities, with PeaceAI's platform and reporting tools by 2025
• Achieve a 20% increase in digital literacy and awareness among Tanzanian citizens on recognizing and responding to online threats by 2025

By closely monitoring these indicators, PeaceAI can continuously evaluate the impact of its solution, identify areas for improvement, and adapt its approach to ensure maximum positive outcomes for the Tanzanian people.

This data-driven impact assessment aligns with the UN Sustainable Development Goals of Peace, Justice, and Strong Institutions (SDG 16) and Reduced Inequalities (SDG 10), which are at the core of PeaceAI's mission.

The core technology powering PeaceAI's solution is a suite of advanced artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms designed to detect and counter online violence, hate speech, and misinformation.

At the heart of the platform is a natural language processing (NLP) engine that can analyze text, images, and audio content shared on social media platforms. Using cutting-edge techniques like sentiment analysis, topic modeling, and named entity recognition, the NLP algorithms can identify harmful narratives, including explicit threats, incitements to violence, and the spread of verifiably false information.

Complementing the NLP capabilities, PeaceAI's platform also leverages computer vision models to detect and flag potentially problematic visual content, such as hate symbols or violent imagery. These AI-powered image recognition tools are trained on large, diverse datasets to ensure accurate and culturally-relevant classification of the content.

To further enhance the platform's accuracy and real-time responsiveness, PeaceAI has developed anomaly detection algorithms that can identify sudden spikes in the volume or tone of online conversations, indicating the potential for coordinated disinformation campaigns or the rapid escalation of tensions.

By combining these advanced AI technologies, PeaceAI is able to process and analyze social media data at scale, providing timely alerts and detailed insights to platform owners, policymakers, and community leaders. This enables rapid and targeted interventions to address emerging threats and promote constructive online dialogue.

Crucially, PeaceAI's AI models are continuously refined through close collaboration with Tanzanian civil society organizations and user feedback, ensuring that the platform remains highly relevant and responsive to the unique local context.

PeaceAI's solution team currently consists of 9 members:

5 full-time staff:

• 1 Chief Executive Officer
• 2 Machine Learning Engineers
• 1 User Experience Designer
• 1 Community Engagement Coordinator

4 part-time staff:

• 1 Data Scientist
• 1 Cybersecurity Specialist
• 1 Legal and Policy Advisor
• 1 Marketing and Communications Specialist

The team brings together a diverse set of skills and expertise, ranging from AI/ML development and data analysis to community outreach and regulatory compliance. This multidisciplinary approach is crucial for delivering a comprehensive and effective solution to address the complex challenges of online violence, hate speech, and misinformation in Tanzania.

PeaceAI has been working on its solution for 16 months. The team was established in January 2023, focusing on research, product development, and community engagement in Tanzania. Over the past year and a half, the team has built the core AI-powered platform, integrated it with major social media platforms, and launched a successful pilot program. This intensive period has enabled PeaceAI to iterate on the solution, gather user feedback, and demonstrate its viability and impact, positioning the team to scale up and drive broader transformative change in Tanzania's digital ecosystem.

PeaceAI is committed to building a diverse, equitable, and inclusive team that reflects the diverse communities it serves in Tanzania. From the outset, the founders have prioritized the recruitment and retention of team members from underrepresented backgrounds, including women, individuals from marginalized ethnic groups, and persons with disabilities.

The leadership team currently comprises three women and two men, with diverse educational and professional backgrounds. This diversity is also reflected in the broader team, where 60% of the staff come from traditionally underrepresented groups in the technology sector.

To further strengthen the team's diversity and inclusivity, PeaceAI has implemented the following measures:

1. Inclusive hiring practices: The company actively sources candidates from a wide range of networks, including local community organizations and academic institutions, to reach a diverse pool of applicants. Job descriptions and interview processes are continuously reviewed to identify and eliminate any unintended biases.

2. Equitable compensation and career development: PeaceAI offers competitive, gender-neutral compensation packages and provides equal opportunities for training, mentorship, and advancement, regardless of an individual's background or identity.

3. Supportive work culture: The company fosters an inclusive work environment where all team members feel valued, respected, and empowered to share their unique perspectives and ideas. Regular team-building activities, mental health support, and flexible work arrangements help to create a welcoming and accommodating workplace.

4. Community engagement: PeaceAI actively collaborates with local community organizations and marginalized groups to better understand their needs and concerns, and to ensure that the solution remains responsive and accessible to all Tanzanians.

By championing diversity, equity, and inclusion at every level of the organization, PeaceAI aims to set an example for the broader technology ecosystem in Tanzania and contribute to the creation of a more just and inclusive digital future.

PeaceAI's business model is centered on providing a comprehensive, AI-powered solution to address the challenges of online violence, hate speech, and misinformation in Tanzania. The company's primary customers and beneficiaries are:

1. Social media platforms: PeaceAI partners with major social media platforms operating in Tanzania, such as Facebook, Twitter, and WhatsApp, to integrate its content moderation and threat detection capabilities directly into their systems. These platform owners pay a subscription fee to access PeaceAI's services, which help them comply with local regulations and maintain a safer, more inclusive digital ecosystem for their users.

2. Tanzanian government and policymakers: PeaceAI collaborates with government agencies and policymakers to provide data-driven insights and policy recommendations to address online harms. The company's services are funded through grants and public-private partnerships, as the Tanzanian government recognizes the importance of creating a secure and resilient digital environment for its citizens.

3. Tanzanian civil society organizations and community leaders: PeaceAI works closely with local NGOs, community groups, and influential figures to empower them with the tools and knowledge to detect, report, and counter online violence and misinformation within their own networks. These partnerships are facilitated through a combination of licensing fees and community-based funding models.

4. Tanzanian social media users: While the primary revenue streams come from the platform owners and policymakers, PeaceAI also provides free-to-use reporting and awareness-raising tools for individual Tanzanian citizens to actively participate in maintaining a safe and inclusive digital space.

By offering a comprehensive, AI-powered solution that addresses the needs of multiple stakeholders, PeaceAI aims to create a sustainable and scalable business model that can drive long-term, transformative change in Tanzania's digital ecosystem.

Since PeaceAI is still in the early stages of development, the company has not yet generated significant financial revenue. However, the team is actively pursuing a multi-pronged strategy to secure the necessary funding to scale the solution and achieve long-term financial sustainability.

One key aspect of PeaceAI's plan is to raise $150,000 from private investors. The company is currently in discussions with several potential investors who have expressed interest in the innovative, AI-powered approach to addressing online violence, hate speech, and misinformation in Tanzania.

In addition to the private investment, PeaceAI is also actively seeking grants and public-private partnership funding to support its work with the Tanzanian government and policymakers. The team is currently preparing grant proposals to organizations such as the United Nations Democracy Fund and the Tanzanian Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, which have previously expressed interest in supporting initiatives that promote digital security and inclusion.

Moreover, PeaceAI is laying the groundwork to generate revenue from its organizational customers, primarily the major social media platforms operating in Tanzania. The team has already initiated discussions with several platform owners and is confident in their ability to secure revenue-generating partnerships in the near future.

Alongside these external funding sources, PeaceAI is also exploring community-based funding models, where Tanzanian civil society organizations and influential community leaders can access the platform's tools and services through licensing agreements. This strategy aims to ensure that the solution remains responsive to the needs of local communities and is accessible to a wide range of stakeholders.

By diversifying its funding sources, PeaceAI is positioned to achieve long-term financial sustainability and continue scaling its innovative solution to create a more secure, inclusive, and peaceful digital ecosystem in Tanzania.