The post EU human rights agency issues report on AI ethical considerations appeared first on AI News.
]]>FRA’s report is titled Getting The Future Right and opens with some of the ways AI is already making lives better—such as helping with cancer diagnosis, and even predicting where burglaries are likely to take place.
“The possibilities seem endless,” writes Michael O’Flaherty, Director of the FRA, in the report’s foreword. “But how can we fully uphold fundamental rights standards when using AI?”
The FRA interviewed over a hundred public administration officials, private company staff, and a diverse range of experts, in a bid to answer that question.
With evidence of algorithms having biases which could lead to automating societal issues like racial profiling—it’s a question that needs answering if the full potential of AI is going to be unlocked for the whole of society.
O’Flaherty says:
“AI is not infallible, it is made by people – and humans can make mistakes. That is why people need to be aware when AI is used, how it works and how to challenge automated decisions. The EU needs to clarify how existing rules apply to AI. And organisations need to assess how their technologies can interfere with people’s rights both in the development and use of AI.
“We have an opportunity to shape AI that not only respects our human and fundamental rights but that also protects and promotes them.”
AI is being used in almost every industry in some form or another—if not already, it will be soon.
Biases in AI are more dangerous in some industries than others. Policing is an obvious example, but in areas like financial services it could mean one person being given a loan or mortgage compared to another.
Without due transparency, these biases could happen without anyone knowing the reasons behind such decisions—it could simply be because someone grew up in a different neighbourhood. Each automated decision has a very real human impact.
The FRA calls for the EU to:
The EU has increased its scrutiny of “big tech” companies like Google in recent years over concerns of invasive privacy practices and abusing their market positions. Last week, AI News reported that Google had controversially fired leading AI ethics researcher Timnit Gebru after she criticised her employer in an email.
Google chief executive Sundar Pichai wrote in a memo: “We need to accept responsibility for the fact that a prominent black, female leader with immense talent left Google unhappily.
“It’s incredibly important to me that our black, women, and under-represented Googlers know that we value you and you do belong at Google.”
Gebru gave an interview to the BBC this week in which she called Google and big tech “institutionally racist”. With that in mind, the calls made in the FRA’s report seem especially important to heed.
You can download a full copy of the FRA’s report here.
(Photo by Guillaume Périgois on Unsplash)
The post EU human rights agency issues report on AI ethical considerations appeared first on AI News.
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