Verity Harding

Verity Harding is one of TIME magazine's 100 Most Influential People in AI. She has been at the centre of the debate on technology and politics for over a decade, from Downing Street to Davos, the G7 to Google. She began her career as a political adviser to the then-Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Sir Nick Clegg. While working for His Majesty's Government, she helped enact the country's first equal marriage act and advised on national security and human rights matters.

Verity joined Google in 2013, leading security policy in Europe and covering serious issues from the use of YouTube by terrorist groups like ISIS to the Reform Government Surveillance coalition campaigns, which brought about reform in lawful data-sharing between US and UK law enforcement. In 2016, as DeepMind's first Global Head of Policy, Harding co-founded the independent non-profit organisation Partnership on AI and DeepMind's in-house policy, ethics and social science research teams. She also served on the OECD's Network of AI Experts, which produced the first set of AI Principles signed by the G20. Verity serves on the Cabinet Office Digital Advisory Board in her spare time, a group of independent experts recruited to provide the UK government insight on digital, data, and technology. She is also a Director of the Royal Academy of Arts and Chair of the Board for Girls Who Code UK.