One of the 52 experts who worked on the guidelines argues that basis is flawed—due to the tech industry. Thomas Metzinger, a thinker from the University of Mainz, in Germany, says too many of the experts who created the guidelines came from or were aligned with industry interests. Metzinger says he and an alternate member of the crowd were asked to draft a list of AI uses that might be prohibited. That list covered independent guns, and govt social scoring techniques akin to those under development in China.
But Metzinger alleges tech’s allies later convinced the wider group that it shouldn’t draw any “red lines” around uses of AI. When a proper draft was released in December, uses that were suggested as requiring “red lines” were offered as examples of “essential considerations. ” That shift seemed to please Microsoft. The agency didn’t have its own seat on the EU expert group, but like Facebook, Apple, and others, was represented via trade group DigitalEurope. In a public touch upon the draft, Cornelia Kutterer, Microsoft’s senior director for EU government affairs, said the crowd had “taken the correct method in choosing to cast these as ‘considerations,’ in preference to as ‘red lines. ’” Microsoft didn’t provide further remark.
Cecilia Bonefeld Dahl, director general for DigitalEurope and a member of the expert group, said its work had been balanced, and not tilted toward industry. “We need to get it right, not to prevent European innovation and welfare, but in addition to bypass the dangers of misuse of AI. ”By April, Microsoft found itself combating towards a House version of the bill it had supported, after the addition of firmer language on facial awareness. The House bill would have required that businesses obtain unbiased affirmation that their technology worked equally well for all skin tones and genders before deploying it. Irene Plenefisch, Microsoft’s director of government affairs, testified against that version of the bill, saying it “would easily ban facial focus era has many a good suggestion uses. ” The house bill stalled.
With lawmakers unable to reconcile differing visions for the laws, Washington’s try and pass a new privacy law collapsed.