Artificial Intelligence and Genealogy

Has there been any discussion of allowing AI access to genealogical databases? I'm an IT manager for a Fortune 100 company that I am just now beginning to see the change that are about to take place. I can see a huge benefit for accuracy and finding ancestors as new databases come online and are accessible.

MikeDaley wrote: Wed Mar 12, 2025 8:36 am Has there been any discussion of allowing AI access to genealogical databases? I'm an IT manager for a Fortune 100 company that I am just now beginning to see the change that are about to take place. I can see a huge benefit for accuracy and finding ancestors as new databases come online and are accessible.

The recent Roots Tech event had an entire hour-long forum about new tech in the FamilySearch tool. Much of it (I would say about half) was about how they are leveraging AI. They already have tools working in the FamilySearch Labs section. https://www.familysearch.org/en/labs/ (login may be required)

https://www.familysearch.org/en/rootste ... highlights

I haven't had a chance to watch the RootsTech session, but I know FamilySearch has been actively working on digitizing records with AI / machine learning for several years – things like handwriting recognition, and parsing information from obituaries. Most of the records that were traditionally indexed by volunteers in past decades are now indexed by computer. Volunteers continue to help with review and correction.