Tech companies say laws limit ‘innovation’ to protect us from bad AI. Well, good | John Naughton

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WIn May 2014, the European Court of Justice issued a landmark ruling that European citizens legally have the right to petition search engines to remove search results linked to material posted on third-party websites. This has been popularly misinterpreted as the “right to be forgotten”; It was correct that certain published material about the complainant was deleted by search engines, of which Google was the most dominant. Or, to put it more crudely, a right not found by Google.

The morning after the verdict was released, I got a phone call from a relatively senior Googler I knew. It’s clear from the call that the company was hammered by the decision — something the expensive legal team hadn’t expected. But it was also clear that the US leaders were outraged by the atrocity of a European institution to make such a judgment. And when I politely expressed what I considered to be reasonable judgment, I was subjected to a violent tirade, the main theme of which was that the problem with Europeans was that they were “enemies of creativity”. At this the conversation ended and I never heard from him again.

What brings this to mind is the tech companies’ response to a draft EU bill published last month that would allow people affected by software to sue companies when it becomes law two years from now. And deploy it. The new draft law, called the AI ​​Liability Directive, complements the EU’s AI legislation and will become EU law at the same time. The purpose of these laws is to prevent technology companies from releasing dangerous systems, such as: algorithms that promote false information and target children with harmful content; Facial recognition systems are often biased; Predictive AI systems that are not accurate for minorities to approve or reject loans or guide local policing strategies etc. In other words, technologies that are currently almost completely unregulated.

The AI ​​Act mandates more scrutiny for “high-risk” uses of AI that have a high potential to harm people, particularly in areas such as policing, employment and healthcare. The new accountability bill says MIT’s Technology assessment Journal, “It would give people and companies the right to sue for damages after being harmed by AI systems. The goal is to hold developers, manufacturers and users of the technologies accountable and explain how their AI systems were built and trained. Tech companies that don’t follow the rules risk EU-wide class actions.” They throw.

Just as noted, the Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA), which represents technology companies in Brussels, has emerged. The letter to the two European commissioners responsible for the two actions immediately raises concerns that imposing strict liability on technology companies is “disproportionate and inappropriate for software properties”. And of course, it can have a “chilling effect” on “creativity”.

Ah yes. That’s the same innovation that led to the 2016 US presidential election and the UK Brexit referendum that led to the Cambridge Analytica scandal and Russian online meddling that allowed live streaming of mass shootings. The same innovation that radicalized extremists and led to the depression of a troubled teenager who ended her life at 10.

It is difficult to decide which of the two criteria set forth by the CCIA—strict liability for software that is “unsuitable” or “innovative”—a hallmark of the industry—is more perverse. For more than 50 years, the technology industry has given other industries extended latitude to avoid legal liability for countless defects and vulnerabilities in its core products, or for damages caused by those defects.

What’s even more surprising is that the technology companies have been using what they claim to be sole proprietors of “innovation” for so long. But now two prominent competition lawyers, Ariel Ezrachi and Maurice Stuke, have called the companies’ bluff. In his wonderful new book, How the big-tech barons are stifling innovation – and how to fight backThey explain how innovative tech companies are adapting to suit their own needs. They show how ruthless tech companies can be to stifle innovation by pre-empting or imitating them, and how the dominance of search engines and social media platforms can limit the visibility of promising innovations that could be competitive or socially beneficial. For an antidote to technology burnout, the book will be hard to beat. It should be required reading for everyone involved with Ofcom, the Competition and Markets Authority and DCMS. And no longer “innovation for whom?” It should be the first question for any technology developer teaching you about innovation.

What I read

The web of time
The thorny problem of maintaining internet time is amazing. new york An essay on genius by Nate Hopper, who many years ago created an arcane software system that synchronized network clocks.

It is believed
Project Fear 3.0 is a great blog by Adam Toze on criticism of the current Tory administration.

Technological progress
Ascension is a thoughtful article by Drew Austin on how our relationship with digital technology will change in 2019-2022.

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