With artificial intelligence (AI) continuing to improve day by day, it’s becoming increasingly a central point in most industries like healthcare, finance, transport, etc. But with power comes responsibility as well.
Yes, AI can change society, but there are also ethical aspects of AI to think about so that AI will be used for good to humanity and not destroy it. This essay examines the ethics of AI and how businesses, developers, and politicians can implement AI technologies in their companies.
Ethics of AI is an interdisciplinary topic that investigates artificial intelligence systems’ moral, ethical, and societal concerns. Equity, privacy, transparency, responsibility, and unfairness in the AI algorithm are addressed by AI ethics.
Not having a normative framework with which to produce and implement ethically sound AI, these tools may exacerbate inequality, erode privacy, or be harnessed to harm.
AI is increasingly being used in fields impacting human life to a considerable extent, and hence, such ethical concerns must be observed. Based on a 2023 survey by PwC, 72% of business leaders believe that AI ethics will be one of the important issues in their company in the future. This indicates growing respect for the use of AI properly.
The Risks of Irresponsible AI
Although AI is promising, it can also prove hazardous if not properly developed and implemented. Perhaps the greatest danger is that AI algorithms are biased. AI programs, having been trained on biased data, can continue to perpetuate biases within society. Facial recognition technology is a great illustration, already being proven to be more prone to error for dark-skinned people, especially women of color.
A study conducted by the MIT Media Lab in 2019 found that facial recognition software available for commercial purchase incorrectly guessed the gender of darker-skinned women as high as 35%—higher than 1% for lighter-skinned men.
The second risk is the invasion of privacy. AI operations are based on enormous amounts of individual data to function optimally, and this has consequences for data ownership and consent. In a 2022 European Union Agency for Cybersecurity survey, 60% of the sample were concerned that their data would be misused by AI-powered systems.
There are then the possible threats of employing AI for ill ends like deepfake, autonomous military weapons, or spyware. The 2023 Global AI Index explains that 23 nations are creating AI technologies expressly for the military, raising eyebrows about impending AI warfare.
Prioritize Fairness and Avoid Bias
Artificial Intelligence designers must make sure that the data employed to train AI is representative and diverse for people impacted by it. Auditing algorithms can become easier by detecting and correcting biases. Fair AI is 27% of the attention in AI research papers, according to the AI Now Institute’s report.
Ensure Transparency and Exploitability
perhaps its most vigorously demonized aspect is that it’s a “black box”–because no one has the slightest idea what types of decisions are being made using algorithms. XAI systems will have to be constructed by AI experts so that the reason for AI decision-making is transferable and clear. A McKinsey study in 2023 revealed that 66% of consumers would use AI systems whose decisions can be explained with the highest focus on ethics.
Improve Privacy Protection
To avoid privacy breaches, companies must develop data privacy policies and enable policy requirements like the GDPR in the EU. Privacy technologies (PETs) like differential privacy and federated learning are increasingly required to keep personal data from leaking through AI processing. Deloitte states that 58% of the organizations already had AI system privacy preservation solutions invested in.
Encourage Accountability
Developers and companies need to be accountable for their AI systems, especially when their AI systems cause harm. Having ethics boards for AI and incorporating multicultural teams to develop theirs can help them make good choices. According to a Gartner report, 35% of businesses are expected to adopt AI governance frameworks as a means of addressing accountability concerns like these.
Work together with Policymakers and Regulators
The ethical development of AI is going hand in hand with cooperation between the government, private institutions, and learning institutions. Governments of the majority of countries are working on laws to promote the ethical development of AI.
In 2021, the European Commission published its AI Act, the first of its kind anywhere in the world, as part of its attempt to ensure that AI technology is developed and used safely and ethically.
The ability of AI to change companies and lives can be enormous if it is designed and implemented ethically. The key to releasing this potential and making it a reality is through giving the greatest possible priority to fairness, transparency, privacy, accountability, and regulation.
Companies and developers can do their best to make sure that AI technologies are not just successful but also accountable.
As the 2024 Global AI Ethics Survey finds, 89% of CEOs think that ethics in AI practices are necessary to trust and achieve lasting success. Today, AI must be applied responsibly, and the choices made today are what will determine the future of AI.