Benefits and risks of artificial intelligence
The panel considered the importance of managing the emerging regulatory landscape and the need for federal, state and international coordination on AI policy. They emphasized how important and timely it is to address potential downsides, such as exploiting AI for malicious purposes and violating privacy.
Andrew Gamino-Cheong, co-founder and CTO of enterprise software company Trustible, says one of the downsides of AI is that it’s used by people who don’t understand it. “A lot of people are putting chatbots and other insecure ideas out there,” he said, citing Snapchat’s recent release of chatbots. “The safety and dangers of how children interact with it have not been studied at all at this time,” he warned.
AI has many benefits as well as risks. There are many tasks that this technology could potentially automate, but the ability to quickly analyze and summarize large amounts of text is especially important for government affairs. Bill Frischling, his vice president of AI at FiscalNote, said he is excited about the latest AI developments. “What I love about technology is that it allows for automation and simplification.”
But AI has many advantages over the basics of generative AI like ChatGPT. Rep. Donald Bayer of Virginia, who has served in Virginia’s 8th congressional district since 2014, is currently pursuing a master’s degree in machine learning at George Mason University. Beyer is particularly excited about the health implications of AI after losing one of his best friends to pancreatic cancer last year. Currently, AI may be able to predict future pancreatic cancer diagnoses up to three years in advance.
Policy areas to watch in the AI landscape
Key policy issues being addressed by Congress include data privacy, algorithmic accountability, and the use of AI in high-risk situations such as nuclear weapon launches.
“I feel strongly that we need to address this issue at the federal level,” Bayer said of AI. “It’s great when the nation moves forward, but then it’s just a patchwork.” His hope is that there will be “a lot of small, meaningful legislation” regulating AI.
One of the important laws is the American Data Privacy and Protection Act. This law addresses the reality that personal information about American citizens can be collected, disaggregated into meaningful pieces, and sold.
The Algorithm Liability Act of 2022 is another significant piece of legislation introduced by New York Democrat Rep. Yvette Clarke. Clark has asked the Federal Trade Commission to create rules for evaluating sensitive systems.
Another notable bill is the 2023 Autonomous Artificial Intelligence Nuclear Launch Banning Act. “If you worry about artificial intelligence being a potentially annihilating event, nothing makes more sense than the launch of a nuclear weapon,” Beyer said. The bill “says no that AI could be involved in a nuclear weapons launch chain. Humans must make that decision.”
AI development cannot escape the attention of local and state governments. There are many uses and types of AI tools, so classifying and categorizing AI use cases is important when creating legislation. “For example, the Colorado Department of Insurance has rules that regulate AI only for life insurance in Colorado,” Gamino Chong said. New York City also has one of the first laws to mandate external AI bias audits, creating a complex regulatory environment for businesses.
AI Boundaries and Ethics
Panelists discussed the impact of generative AI, data privacy, and copyright protection in government agencies. They recognized the potential benefits of using AI to improve the efficiency of reviewing applications, credit scores, and other processes, but also recognized the need to involve humans to ensure accuracy and reliability. Did.
They discuss the challenges in setting boundaries around the use of AI in political advertising, education, and personal information, and the potential for AI to be used inappropriately in personnel and recruitment processes, recidivism prediction, and foster care settings. Did. Applying AI to cases like this is “an end-to-end problem of actually making direct nomination predictions about whether a candidate should be promoted,” said Vlad Eidelman, chief technology officer at Fiscalnaut. should not be used for “I think there are more nuances out there, and where people are looking for simple solutions, more snake oil can seep in.”
Panelists also touched on the need for clear legal and ethical standards, particularly in data privacy, copyright protection, and the use of AI in social media. In general, Bayer said, “the American public and people around the world will become skeptical of what they see, seek additional sources of information, dig deeper, and challenge the interpretability of AI.” We need to be trained on.” For me, it’s one of the hardest things to figure out how to regulate. ”
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