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Searching for arti.cial intelligence we

can trust.
Albert Vilariño Alonso Follow
Oct 30 · 5 min read

Photo by Franck V. on Unsplash

Note: This article was .rst published in Spanish and can be found here.

Laying the foundations of how to minimize the risks of arti.cial intelligence

(AI) while maximizing the bene.ts of it is a necessity to which oCcial
bodies seem to begin to respond.

We need, sooner rather than later, to think, regulate, legislate and

respond to dilemmas arising from the implementation of this technology
increasingly closer to our horizon.

As part of this need for a response, the High-Level Expert Group on Arti.cial
Intelligence (AI HLEG) of the European Commission has begun developing
a draft of the Ethical Guidelines on AI that should produce a .nal
document this year 2019.

These Guidelines want to go beyond a simple enumeration of essential

principles and values and aim to serve as a guide for their real application in
AI systems, oPering various levels of abstraction.

The group of AI experts is made up of 52 representatives from civil society,

industry and university, and its main objective is to advise the Commission
on the next steps that will address the medium and long-term challenges
and opportunities related to AI through recommendations that will be
incorporated into the policy development process, the legislative evaluation
process and the development of upcoming digital strategies.

Experts advocate an AI approach focused on the welfare of human beings

but from reliability. People should be able to rely on AI because it is the
only way they can fully bene.t from it, something I totally agree with.

In human relationships, trust is key to achieving a mutual bene;t for all

parties in any situation (for example, buying, selling, negotiating, etc.), and
it will not be less if instead of dealing with people we are doing with
machines or software-driven by algorithms that we cannot touch, which in
many cases are opaque to our eyes in terms of their operation, and that will
play a huge role in our lives in a short time.

Below I will present some points that are considered by the experts as main
when discussing AI, its relationship with human beings and their
con.dence in it.

Components of reliable arti0cial intelligence.

Reliability manifested by experts includes con.dence in technology,
(through the way it is built and used by humans), con.dence in the rules,
laws and regulations governing AI, and trust in business models of services,
products, and AI manufacturers.

In addition, reliable AI will be understood as the one that meets two

speci;c premises:

It must respect the fundamental rights, the laws in force and the
essential principles and values, in a way that guarantees an “ethical
purpose”.

It must be reliable and technically sound, since a limited technological

domain can cause unintentional damage, even if the intentions are good.

The two previous premises translate into various requirements that must
be met.

For example, one of the essential requirements (experts put them in the
draft in an alphabetical order to emphasize the importance of all of them) is
the design for all.

Systems should be designed so that all citizens can use the products or
services, regardless of their age, disability status or social status.
Particularly important to consider accessibility for people with disabilities,
which are a horizontal category of society, present in all social groups.

Non-discrimination is another requirement and refers to the variability of

the results of AI between individuals or groups of people depending on the
exploitation of diPerences in their characteristics that can be considered
intentionally or not (such as ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation or age),
and that may adversely aPect such individuals or groups.

Respect for privacy is also very important. Privacy and data protection must
be guaranteed at all stages of the AI system life cycle.

The above includes all the data provided by the user, but also all the
information generated by the user throughout his interactions with the AI
system.

More requirements set forth in the draft are accountability, data

governance, governance of AI autonomy, respect for human autonomy,
robustness, security or transparency.

How can we ensure that AI has developed in a

human-centered way?
In the same way that those previous requirements would ensure that AI is
reliable, there are also a series of principles to ensure that it has developed
around the human being, taking it into account in a central way.

These ;ve principles will sound a bit like Asimov’s books and science
.ction movies.

The principle of Bene;cence requires that AI systems must be designed and

developed to improve individual and collective well-being, and generating
prosperity, value creation and maximization of wealth and sustainability.

The principle of Non-male;cence points out that AI systems should not

harm human beings. By design, these systems must protect the dignity,
integrity, freedom, privacy, safety, and security of human beings in society
and at work, without threatening the democratic process, freedom of
expression, freedom of identity or the possibility of reject AI services.

The Autonomy principle says that human beings who interact with AI
systems must maintain full and ePective self-determination about
themselves.

The principle of Justice proclaims that AI systems must be fair, and

developers and implementers must ensure that individuals and minority
groups remain free of bias, stigmatization, and discrimination.

Finally, the Explicability principle says that transparency is key to building

and maintaining citizen con.dence in the developers of AI systems and in
the systems themselves, since both technological transparency and the
business model matter from an ethical point of view.

Experts point out that, in particular situations, tensions may arise

between the principles when viewed from the point of view of an
individual compared to the point of view of society and vice versa.

What have the experts not agreed on?

As in all types of guides and documents made by many participants, in this
issue, there have also been discrepancies between them and unresolved
concerns that they hope will be resolved with a consultation of the
stakeholders.

Among those critical concerns are, for example, those related to the
identi.cation without consent of individual persons by public or private
entities, the implications derived from the fact that at one point a human
does not know that he is interacting with a machine instead of another
human, or autonomous lethal weapons systems.

In short, and as happens with many of these long documents, I encourage

the reader interested in this topic to deepen the reading of the draft AI
HLEG to gain greater knowledge of the subject and its importance for all of
us, impossible to summarize completely in this article.

Arti>cial Intelligence Trust Transparency Algorithms Corporate Responsibility

WRITTEN BY

Albert Vilariño Alonso Follow

Consultant in Corporate Social Responsibility, Sustainability,

Reputation and Corporate Communication,and integration of
people with disabilities.

Write the >rst response

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