AI Governance starts with Data Governance
Introduction
Responding to Calls for Action
The rapid advancement of artificial intelligence (AI) has brought humanity to a critical juncture. The recent international conference, AI for Good, organized by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), underscored the situation's urgency. Our society stands at a tipping point where the potential of AI could either accelerate progress towards the United Nations' 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) or drive us towards an uncertain societal future. The ITU secretary general and other senior speakers asked for a global call for action.
Such a call for action also comes from other initiatives around the globe. Here are a few examples. Calls for European Health Data Space digitally connecting healthcare practitioners while protecting patients' rights, development of national digital Identities including biometrics, advancing precision medicine and the use of genomic data, strengthening Internet of Things (IoT) governance for more efficient supply chains and many others. All these examples share a common governance requirement: regulating algorithmic decision-making.
Prioritizing the development of governance models for the deployment of AI is our immediately actionable, best hope for developing an AI that serves as a force for good. The task is complex and far-reaching. Everyone must coherently feed policymakers pertinent information to establish the right governance framework.
Therefore, the existing multi-stakeholder framework of the SDGs offers a stage to structure the flow of concerns and the experience gained from projects impacting society through digital tooling.
Data fuel AI. As a result, data is also a promising avenue of progress for governance. To do so, we need to reshape our approach to data. By reimagining our relationship with data and promoting responsible data usage, we can simplify the regulation of AI deployment, leading us towards a sustainable and inclusive society.
Rethinking our relation to data and building the tools to make it happen is part of the mission of the Human Colossus Foundation. We promote data-centric architecture for the common good. As our contribution to the calls for action, this blog post introduces a series of upcoming publications and activities that link data governance to technological architectures.
AI & SDG
Will Artificial Intelligence accelerate United Nations Sustainable Developments Goals ?
The SDGs represent a comprehensive roadmap towards a better future, encompassing crucial areas such as poverty eradication, education, healthcare, and environmental sustainability. However, the progress towards achieving these goals must catch up to projections as the 2030 deadline approaches.
AI has the potential to serve as a catalyst for progress, significantly accelerating our journey towards these goals. Yet, it also risks exacerbating existing disparities and creating a society where control over AI becomes a battle, benefitting only a few. A robust AI governance system can ensure the optimistic scenario's success.
The Imperative Role of Data
The existence of atoms weaves the very fabric of our physical reality. In the realm of information, data is the one thing AI algorithms hinge on. Data is the fabric of the AI space.
Get ready for an AI-driven data frenzy, with a staggering 56% year-on-year increase in data production in 2020 alone. Get ready all the more because we have already accumulated a staggering 64 zeta bytes of data, most of it unstructured. Unstructured data refers to data that does not have a specified format or organisation. This data is typically not easily searchable or categorised. So, dig deep into your organisation's resources to curate that data or brace for the havoc wreaked by poorly trained AI. The choice is yours, but the consequences are real for others.
Practitioners already appreciate the critical role of data in AI operations as they constantly search for more data. While data is the essential bedrock of AI, we often overlook the importance of data governance upon which policymakers can build sound AI governance. Proper data governance gives information management systems more transparent data access, better assurance of data accuracy, and a finer level of security standards. Therefore, it is imperative to recognise the value of data governance before attempting to rule AI deployment.
Promoting Responsible Data Usage
AI, as a force for good, is about responsible data usage, a cornerstone of effective data governance. It entails ethical collection, storage, and data utilisation while prioritising privacy and security. Organisations can establish transparent and accountable data practices with robust data governance frameworks. Governance ensures that individuals' rights are respected while also addressing concerns around bias, discrimination, and the potential misuse of data. By fostering a culture of responsible data usage, we lay the foundation for a fair and just AI ecosystem.
Regulating AI Deployment
The intricate nature of AI that mixes data and algorithms poses challenges to effective regulation. However, we can simplify the regulatory approach by placing data governance at the forefront. By treating data as a first-class citizen, data governance aligns data usage with the values a community wants to protect through regulations and ethics. Then AI governance reduces to Machine governance. In other words, AI governance focuses on regulating AI deployment instead of AI development. In this view, AI governance is closer to AI solution certifications by defining domain-specific standards and assurance levels, for example. A data-centric approach enables policymakers and regulators to focus on data-related aspects, such as data quality, privacy protection, and accountability for algorithmic data transformation.
Streamlining the regulatory process through data governance has another subtle but essential consequence: decoupling the regulation of AI development from the regulation of AI deployment. Innovation is unstoppable. Thus regulating AI development is complex and will prove virtually impossible to enforce globally. Data governance does not stop AI development. It first structures and limits the data the AI system can ingest. Second, it constrains the algorithmic data transformation process that must respond to lawful purposes. The data governance approach to AI governance provides a granular framework that can meet domain-specific constraints and respect the underlying Human values embedded in responsible data governance.
Also, the data approach has the advantage of not exposing fundamental aspects of the regulation to the ever-changing technological landscape. Ruling data usage is to protect the core values of a community. The specific implementation risks are left to the certification of the deployment of solutions.
Responding to a Call for action as a first conclusion
The future of AI and its impact on society hinges on our ability to govern it effectively. While AI's potential to drive progress towards the SDGs is immense, responsible practices and regulations must guide the deployment of AI solutions.
The Human Colossus Foundation firmly believes that by embracing data governance as the starting point, a foundation of trust, fairness, and accountability provides the bedrock for practical AI governance. Through responsible data usage, targeted regulations, and a commitment to inclusivity, we can harness the power of AI to reshape our world sustainably and inclusively.
Our beliefs are backed by actions developed through a data-centric architecture we promote as "Dynamic Data Economy". This architecture builds on the core concepts of distributed governance, decentralised semantics, and decentralised authentication.
Therefore, a contribution to the call for action within our reach is to expose the Dynamic Data Economy architecture through a stream of publications and events to promote an understanding of the relationship between data governance and technological developments.
The time for action is now, as the choices we make today will shape the trajectory of our society for years to come.
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