Ethics Is Not Enough
Having established the objectives of public interest for the implementation of automated decision systems and assuming an adequate approach to the quality of the data used to avoid betraying said objectives, we still need to analyze how to implement such systems from the perspective of the impact on the rights of the citizens whom these measures intend to serve.
Experts from multiple disciplines in the region5 and outside of it6 claim for an ethical treatment of AI data, as a way to face the risks that its implementation may have in the affectation of rights. However, those of us who work on the sidewalk for the promotion and protection of fundamental rights believe that ethics is a starting point that does not exhaust or satisfy the current regulatory requirements, such as the international human rights framework, as well as the constitutional guarantees that each country provides to its inhabitants.
The specific protection of such rights calls for regulations that can ensure their effectiveness in the present and also in the future, when the exercise of these rights will increasingly depend on inscrutable systems that will determine access to social protection programs,7 the resolution of judicial conflicts8 or the freedom of criminally prosecuted persons.9 What all these initiatives have in common is that they are control mechanisms for people in vulnerable situations, exposed to interventions that they do not have the capacity to consent to. To impose opaque systems whose decisions limit the rights of people -without giving the affected parties any margin of autonomy regarding their participation, nor the possibility of appealing, claiming and eventually demanding reparations- reinforces and amplifies the injustices that originally produced the situations of vulnerability.
Ethics is not enough, in democratic states where there is a normative commitment to promote and protect human rights, those technologies that fundamentally impact the exercise of civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights, demand regulatory intervention, whatever the creative, multidisciplinary and flexible way in which States can approach this challenge. Innovation, far from being harmed, can be developed in a sustainable framework and provided with adequate economic incentives for integral human development.
4 https://aplusalliance.org/
5 See: https://publications.iadb.org/es/la-gestion-etica-de-los-datos
6 https://www.oecd.org/going-digital/ai/principles/
7 “Alerta Niñez” in Chile. http://www.crececontigo.gob.cl/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/OOTT-OLN.pdf
8 Like “Prometea” in Argentina. https://ialab.com.ar/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/prometea_oea-1.pdf
9 Like “Prisma” in Colombia. https://www.elespectador.com/noticias/judicial/prisma-el-programa-de-la-fiscaliapara-predecir-la-reincidencia-criminal-articulo-867214
Table of Contents
- Artificial Intelligence For What?
- Data Quality
- Ethics Is Not Enough
- Involved rights beyond privacy
- How Are Intelligence Strategies Being Developed In Our Region?
- From Standards to Practical Applications
- Artificial Intelligence from The South