Today, women occupy pivotal roles in artificial intelligence, from designing robots and developing machine learning models for the healthcare sector to contributing actively to advanced research. It is an encouraging sign that we live in a region where opportunities for women are expanding with fewer obstacles, and where competence is assessed primarily on the basis of knowledge and skills above all else.
Yet concerns have emerged about biases embedded in some of the AI models increasingly in use, which may adversely affect women and minorities. This calls for heightened awareness and deliberate action to ensure the creation of more equitable and inclusive technologies.
Bias in AI
Bias in AI systems often stems from training models on unbalanced datasets that insufficiently represent women and minority groups. In the healthcare sector, this imbalance can compromise diagnostic accuracy for female patients, thereby reducing the effectiveness of AI-driven medical tools.
In robotics, the underrepresentation of women within design teams may result in systems that overlook physical differences and diverse interaction styles, affecting usability and communication.
Bias in AI systems often stems from training models on unbalanced datasets that insufficiently represent women and minority groups.
Bias can also surface in the banking sector through automated systems that disproportionately reject women’s loan applications, as well as in recruitment processes where qualified candidates are excluded from shortlists due to algorithmic filtering.
Addressing Bias
A UNESCO report published in September 2025, titled “Tackling Gender Bias and Harms in Artificial Intelligence,” found that 58 percent of young women and girls had experienced online harassment. The same report noted that women constituted only 30 percent of AI professionals.
At the same time, data from the Gulf countries and the broader Middle East and North Africa region show that women are achieving strong outcomes in higher education, particularly in STEM disciplines (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics). In my own observation, women are increasingly pursuing studies in artificial intelligence, even when coming from fields such as medicine or engineering.
Looking back, we find many examples of women’s innovations and inventions that changed daily life.
Just in the field of automotive history, it’s worth noting that June McCarroll conceived the idea of painting a white line down the centre of the road to create separate lanes after narrowly avoiding a collision in her Ford Model T in 1917.
Mary Anderson is recognised in the National Inventors Hall of Fame as the inventor of the windshield wiper, which made driving in the rain safer. Margaret Wilcox is cited by Wheaton Brothers as the inventor of the car heating system that made driving in cold weather more comfortable.
Women can provide an essential perspective that prioritises equity, safety, and security technology development, helping ensure that systems are safe, reliable, and fair for all.
Although the societal impact of AI may not be directly comparable to that of the automobile, these historical examples illustrate that women have made—and will continue to make—significant contributions to technological advancement.
In the field of AI, women can provide an essential perspective that prioritises equity, safety, and security within technology development systems, helping ensure that such systems are safe, reliable, and fair for all.
Hind Zantout is deputy academic head of the School of Mathematical and Computer Sciences at Heriot-Watt University Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates.
