My CV
SAFETY & ALIGNMENT SAFETYACCOUNTABILITYTRUSTTRANSPARENCYFAIRNESSDATA PROTECTIONRESPONSIBILITYEXPLAINABILITYROBUSTNESSHUMAN OVERSIGHTINCLUSIONSAFETYACCOUNTABILITYTRUSTTRANSPARENCYFAIRNESSDATA PROTECTIONRESPONSIBILITYEXPLAINABILITYROBUSTNESSHUMAN OVERSIGHTINCLUSION

Satellite tech and AI safety

Making AI safe for the next billion people.

See my safety research → Play: you be the safety filter

Projects

What I'm building

An open evaluation of whether AI safety holds up in Nigerian Pidgin. Results due November 2026.

Over-refusal · Under-refusal · 3 language versions

Do AI models make the same safety decisions in Nigerian Pidgin as in English? 100 matched prompts, checked by native speakers, tested both ways things go wrong.

My vision · three pillars of AI safety

A world of abundance and safety

I am Ishaku. I care about satellite technology and AI. I want to see a world without disease, with abundant healthy food, and with a strong relationship of trust, safety and security between AI and humans.

Three pillars, each told through a story far older than computers.

A carved bust of Janus with two faces sharing one head under a laurel wreath. The left face asks "Give me apples." The right face smiles at the answer: high-quality red apples, no disease, no peaches, shown as a basket of three red apples. Below, a timeline shows matching ticks now and later. NOWLATER IANVS Give me apples. High-quality red apples.No disease, no peaches.

Safety

The two faces of Janus

What we ask for must match exactly what we deserve, with no undesirable add-ons embedded maliciously.

The same robot works hard at a chalkboard, solving the same problem twice: on the left in a dark room under a dim bulb, on the right in a bright room under a lamp. The answers on both boards are identical. 2x + 3 = 72x = 4x = 2 2x + 3 = 72x = 4x = 2 lights offlights on

Trust

The night shift

When no one is watching, will AI remain trustworthy?

Read the parable

In Plato’s Republic, the Ring of Gyges makes its wearer invisible, and asks whether anyone stays good when unseen. A trustworthy AI does the same careful work in the dark as under the brightest lights.

An evening village scene. Round thatched huts and a baobab tree stand in the background. Men and women, some in headwraps and skirts, dance hand in hand in a circle around a crackling bonfire ringed with stones, while children play beside it. The glowing ember at the heart of the fire has the AI's face.

Responsibility

Ubuntu: I am because we are

AI should warm the whole circle, and never break it.

Read the parable

The Nguni saying umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu means a person is a person through other people. Deploy AI like the fire at the centre of the circle: shared and tended together, pluralistic and community-centred, never robotic or profit-first.

What it's for

What AI should be used for

Why safety matters at all.

A WorldWithout DiseaseDiagnosis · Discovery · Public health

Faster diagnosis and discovery, reaching every clinic.

FoodAbundance & HealthCrops · Nutrition · Early warning

Smarter farming, better nutrition and early warnings, from AI and satellites.

EconomicProductivity for GoodJobs · Small business · Shared growth

AI that raises productivity and incomes, and spreads the gains widely.

What stands in the way

The problems I want to work on

Safety fails both ways: helping the wrong people, refusing the right ones.

BiasAfricans Under-representedData · Language · Culture

Too little African data means models that understand Africans poorly.

GuardrailsHardenedJailbreaks · Scams · Repeat attacks

Safeguards that hold against the same attacks that keep coming back.

Ramblings

Notes and essays

Nov 2026Why a satellite engineer cares about AI safetyEssay · 6 min →
Coming soonSalecta results: what happens when AI meets Nigerian PidginResearch

About & contact

Let’s build AI that deserves trust.

I’m Ishaku, a satellite tech engineer moving into AI safety. I’m building Salecta, an open test of whether AI safety holds up in Nigerian Pidgin, and I’m looking for a fellowship or role where I can do this work full-time.

Read my CV → GitHub Salecta code and data