PayPal has appointed Srini Venkatesan as its new Chief Technology Officer (CTO) to lead its artificial intelligence initiatives. Venkatesan will be in charge of areas such as AI and machine learning, information security, and product engineering. Venkatesan has developed a platform to support retail giants in the WAL -Mart position, including all aspects of the WAL -Mart+subscription service. He has also been Yahoo and eBay.

Why is this important?

Like others in the financial space, PayPal has sought to embrace AI to improve its services. In January, the company announced new AI-powered tools, including some to make payment checkout smoother. However, other tools use purchase history rather than browsing history to target customers. Smart Receipts use purchase history to recommend products, cash back and other offers on receipts. Likewise, the 'Additional Offers Platform' uses AI to provide targeted promotions based on the customer's purchase history at any previous merchant. PayPal says it's moving away from generic ads and toward personalized "offers" to improve the customer experience.

In a PayPal Newsroom article, the company said it is adding simple privacy controls that will allow customers to choose whether to share their data with merchants to receive personalized offers. However, given that serving targeted ads already raises privacy concerns, purchase history may also raise privacy concerns. Venkatesan is expected to implement the technology and solve these problems in his new role.