AI and Automation: Navigating Legal and Ethical Boundaries

Artificial Intelligence is evolving rapidly and spontaneously, raising a lot of questions in the fields of ethics and lawful regulations. The last few years of AI’s development have been especially intense, provoking various reactions ranging from interest, curiosity, and excitement to concern and downright fear. While business owners and company leaders had to come to terms with the expansion of AI and its growth potential, this technology raises potential risks and ethical issues that have to be addressed by law. AI needs to be governed and regulated now more than ever. Let’s review the frameworks released by governments all over the world to guide the use of AI technology.

AI Regulation Measures

AI has been vastly implemented across various industries. Whether you need to open a new bank account or get $200 online, AI bots and financial advisors are there to help. With AI-powered algorithms already working behind the scenes of most financial operations, there’s a growing concern about maintaining cybersecurity and protecting personal data. Let’s look at some guidelines that have already been introduced by countries worldwide to lawfully address various AI-related issues.

The EU Artificial Intelligence Act

The European Union was among the first official bodies to address the risks connected to AI technology by articulating the EU AI Act. This document outlines various dangers posed by AI-powered technology and classifies AI risks into different categories, such as:

• Unacceptable.
• High.
• Limited.
• Minimal.

This way, the EU plans to govern the use of AI systems according to the risk category they fall into, thus, preventing possible negative outcomes of using this type of tools and software.

The Framework Convention on Artificial Intelligence

Opened to signature in 2024, this is the first international legally binding treaty ever created in the field of Artificial Intelligence that is meant to uphold human rights and make sure that the use of AI stays within lawful boundaries across various industries. Trying to stay technology-neutral so as to not impede the technological advancement of AI, this Framework Convention aims to fill in any legal gaps that may arise in connection with Artificial Intelligence and its usage. Signed by the U.S. government and 46 more member states of the Council of Europe, along with Mexico, Canada, and Japan, it was also observed by 68 representatives of academia and civil society.

The Framework Convention reviews such fundamental principles:

• Reliability.
• Safe innovation.
• Individual autonomy and human dignity.
• Oversight and transparency.
• Accountability.
• Non-discrimination.
• Equality.
• Personal security and protection of private data.

Procedural Rights and Safeguards

The Convention also outlined the minimum risk management practices such as remedies for violations, procedural safeguards, digital literacy efforts, and public consultation. Let’s review some of them.

• There should be effective possibilities to lodge a complaint regarding AI to the authorities.
• There should be enough AI-related information available to all the users to enable them to challenge the use of AI systems and the decisions made using these systems.
• There should be documented information on AI systems and their usage available to all the people affected by those systems.
• There should be efficient procedural safeguards and guarantees governing the rights of persons affected by AI-powered systems when these systems have a significant impact on their lives in order to protect their fundamental freedoms and human rights.
• A notice should always be provided whenever a person is interacting with an AI bot and not an actual human being to avoid misunderstandings.

The Framework Convention established the following risk and impact management requirements:

• The authorities should be able to ban or introduce a moratorium on certain usage of AI systems or AI-powered algorithms.
• A risk and impact assessment should always be conducted whenever AI technology is introduced to understand its possible impact on human rights, freedoms, and the rule of law.
• Ample risk mitigation and prevention measures should be established as a result of such assessments.

The U.S. Executive Orders Concerning AI

Former President Biden’s Executive Order concerning AI is probably the most important move made by the U.S. government to regulate the development and use of AI. Named “Safe, Secure, and Trustworthy Development and Use of Artificial Intelligence,” this order ensures that Americans’ privacy is protected, along with their security and civil rights. At the same time, the importance of AI potential is also accepted, but the main goal is still to provide a safe and secure use of AI systems. The order also states that AI tools need to undergo proper evaluations to understand and mitigate risks connected to them before they are put to wider use. The risks in question are:

• Cybersecurity.
• The integrity of national security.
• Biotechnology.
• Critical infrastructure.

In order to safely use AI systems, the government body needs to provide post-deployment performance monitoring to ensure that Artificial Intelligence systems are working as intended and can’t be used unlawfully and cause harm to society in any way.

Conclusion

The boom of AI system development revealed an urgent need to regulate Artificial Intelligence on various levels, including governmental bodies, industry leaders, and experts from private sectors. It requires a collaborative effort that will ensure AI tools are used in accordance with the rule of law while governing human rights and freedoms. Most countries have already addressed these issues and proposed various guidelines and frameworks to mitigate possible AI-related risks, but it is important to evaluate various AI systems continuously due to their rapid development speed.