Ireland should seek to use AI in order to promote EU ideals “globally”, the chairman of the country’s AI committee has said.
The comments were made this week by Fianna Fáil TD Malcolm Byrne, who was speaking during the first ever meeting of the Irish parliament’s Joint Oireachtas Committee on Artificial Intelligence.
This newly-formed committee is tasked with shaping Ireland’s national approach to AI, both in terms of regulation and opportunity.
“WE NEED TO INFUSE AI WITH EUROPEAN VALUES”
Byrne was responding to remarks by Dr. Susan Leavy, Assistant Professor in the School of Information and Communication, who said that the most important question Irish lawmakers should be asking is “how we can develop AI algorithms with European values at their centre.”
Byrne agreed, and expressed the view that Irish lawmakers had a “fear” that China and the US were going in a “different direction” to Europe regarding tech regulation. He said for this reason it was important that EU values were built into artificial intelligence technology.
“I am conscious of and totally agree that we need to infuse AI with European values,” Byrne said.
“Our challenge is that Europe has moved in the regulatory space, but there is a fear concerning regulation in the US and China going in a different direction. This is particularly the case with the EU’s AI Act.”
He added: “Some of what the Chinese Communist Party is allowing to happen through the use of AI is specifically prohibited in Europe. How can we ensure that European values are applied globally?”
GDPR LAWS A PRECEDENT OF HOW TO FORCE FOREIGN COMPANIES TO “CONFORM” TO EU REGULATIONS
Leavy replied that she did not think it was possible to project European values technologically in this way.
“I do not think we can,” she said, adding: “We can focus on Europe, being the best in class and leading by example. If other people choose to adopt an approach because it has good results…”
However, Professor Alan Smeaton, Emeritus Professor of Computing at Dublin City University, and member of Ireland’s AI Advisory Council, said that GDPR laws set a precedent for how foreign organisations and companies could be forced to “conform” to European regulations.
“One of the things we can learn from the GDPR regulations that apply to Europe is that if an organisation, an entity or a company from outside Europe wants to sell in Europe, it will have to conform to those regulations,” he said.
“WHO WANTS TO HAVE CHATGPT EUROPE AND CHATGPT FOR THE REST OF THE WORLD? IT’S TOO MUCH OF AN OVERHEAD COST”
“We have seen that the bar set by the GDPR has been adopted by other companies and jurisdictions because they do not want to have two products.
“Who wants to have ChatGPT Europe and ChatGPT for the rest of the world? It’s too much of an overhead cost for companies to do it. The experience from the GDPR is that they will raise their standards to that bar. I hope and think the expectation with the EU’s AI Act is that companies would conform to it, not just to be able to sell a product and deliver it in Europe but to do so globally because that makes it easier to manage.”
IT IS A “EUROPEAN CHARACTERISTIC” TO WANT CONTROLS ON “MANY ASPECTS OF OUR SOCIETY”
During the discussion, Smeaton also pointed out that Ireland needed to find the “sweet spot” between “innovation and regulation”, adding that it was “important” that the committee did not make a mistake in this regard like “another part of the world”.
He added that it was a “European characteristic” to want to see “control” on “many aspects of our society.”
“It is a European characteristic that we accept, welcome or want to see an element of control and regulation on many aspects of our society, more so than other places,” he said.
He also said during the discussion that “Staying close to Europe on EU regulations and guiding and working closely with our colleagues there will also be important to us.”
AMERICA’S APPROACH TO TECH REGULATION GIVING “PAUSE FOR CONCERN”
During the discussion Fine Gael TD James Geoghan also echoed Byrne’s view that America’s approach to Big Tech regulation gave “pause for concern”, saying that foreign companies were operating in a “wild west manner.” He said that Ireland is “uniquely placed to play a leading role in the regulatory discussion that is taking place” in Europe.
“Ireland is uniquely placed to play a leading role in the regulatory discussion that is taking place and potentially in the adaptation of AI within our State,” Geoghan said.
“We cannot be naive, however, in simply adapting what these companies are creating into our system in a kind of a wild west manner. In fairness, some of the regulatory stuff coming out of the United States at the moment would give us all pause for concern.
“I hope this committee can lean on the expertise that exists in this country. Seven of the top 11 large language model, LLM, companies are based here. A lot of them are based in my constituency, apart from anything else. We can learn a lot from what they are doing and from engaging with them.”
WE NEED TO RESPOND TO AI IN “A WAY THAT IS EXTREMELY EUROPEAN”
He added that the AI issue would need to be responded to in “a way that is extremely European”.
“We need to respond appropriately in a European way because Europe is a continent of innovation,” he said.
“While we have competitiveness challenges with the United States and China at the moment, we should not lose sight of our own identity. I am confident that Europe can adapt AI in a way that is extremely European. I hope Ireland can use the opportunity presented by what is taking place in the world right now to lead in that regard.”
REGULATING “MISINFORMATION” AND “FAKE NEWS”
The topic of regulating information came up repeatedly during the discussion, with one Fine Gael TD saying that while she was excited about AI’s benefits, she was “terrified” of its potential to spread, among other things, “misinformation”.
“I am also terrified…I am worried about the scams, fraud and misinformation and the huge disconnect between generations,” said Keira Keogh TD.
Fine Gael Senator Gareth Scahill expressed concern about AI “hallucinations” and “misinformation”, while People Before Profit TD Paul Murphy said unregulated AI would lead to the “proliferation of fake news.”
“AI will lead to the degradation of our public spaces and culture through the proliferation of fake news,” he said.
“We no longer get accurate information from a Google search. We used to get accurate information from Google, but we now get an AI summary which will contain hallucinations of fake news. That is not even being done deliberately. AI is used to spread false information, narratives and so on.”