Basic ethical questions of transparency and bias in AI remain unsolved, experts say

Big Tech companies are expected to perform a delicate balancing act in advancing AI development, while ensuring the technology’s ethical application

Proponents see AI as an opportunity to transform a broad swathe of industries, including transport, financial services, retail and media

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Beyond data privacy issues, artificial intelligence applications have the potential to exacerbate many of the challenges the world faces with bias and discrimination. Photo: Shutterstock

Published: 11:00pm, 17 Jun 2021Updated: 11:00pm, 17 Jun 2021

Artificial intelligence (AI) has become a powerful tool around the world, but advances in the technology have also introduced a big challenge in terms of its ethical use, experts said on Thursday at the South China Morning Post’s annual China Conference.

“AI is genuinely a huge challenge to data privacy,” said Alan Chiu, managing partner at Hong Kong law firm ELLALAN. “Big data analysis, at least in some ways, inherently conflicts or stretches the limits of fundamental data protection principles.”

Without elaborating, Chiu declared that “most AI technologies lack transparency”.

Any trepidation about AI, however, has long been quashed by proponents who see AI as an opportunity to transform a broad swathe of industries, including transport, financial services, retail and media. That is especially true in mainland China, where the Big Tech companies represent the AI sector’s biggest investors, developers and users.

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AI-driven identity verification using facial recognition, for example, has been widely adopted in China. The technology has become an integral part of apps from mobile payments and travel to retail, as well as surveillance systems and online platforms for government services.

Basic ethical questions of transparency and bias in AI remain unsolved, experts say

Big Tech companies are expected to perform a delicate balancing act in advancing AI development, while ensuring the technology’s ethical application Proponents see AI as an opportunity to transform a broad swathe of industries, including transport, financial services, retail and media

Big Tech companies are expected to perform a delicate balancing act in advancing AI development, while ensuring the technology’s ethical application

Proponents see AI as an opportunity to transform a broad swathe of industries, including transport, financial services, retail and media