The European Parliament adopted by 559 votes to 44, with 88 abstentions, with recommendations to the Commission on a framework of ethical aspects of artificial intelligence, robotics and related technologies.
Human-centric and human-made artificial intelligence
Parliament called on the Commission to propose a comprehensive regulatory framework of ethical principles and legal obligations relating to the development, deployment and use of artificial intelligence, robotics and related technologies within the Union, including the software, algorithms and data used or produced by these technologies.
This framework should be based on Union law, the Charter and international human rights law, and applicable, in particular, to high-risk technologies, in order to establish equal standards throughout the Union.
Such an approach should allow companies to introduce innovative products onto the market and create new opportunities, while ensuring the protection of Union values by leading to the development of AI systems which incorporate Union ethical principles by design. Such a values-based regulatory framework would represent added value by providing the Union with a unique competitive advantage.
Principles of the requested regulation
The ‘Regulation on ethical principles for the development, deployment and use of artificial intelligence, robotics and related technologies’ should be based on the following principles:
- human-centric, human-made and human-controlled artificial intelligence, robotics and related technologies;
- mandatory compliance assessment of high-risk artificial intelligence, robotics and related technologies and the issuing by the competent national supervisory body of a European certificate of ethical compliance when the assessment is positive;
- safety, transparency and accountability: technologies should be used in a secure manner, inform users that they are interacting with artificial intelligence systems and allow, in case of non-compliance with the stated safety features, temporary deactivation restoring safe functionality;
- safeguards and remedies against bias and discrimination;
- right to redress;
- social responsibility and gender equality in artificial intelligence, robotics and related technologies;
- environmentally sustainable artificial intelligence, robotics and related technologies;
- respect for privacy and limitations on the use of biometric recognition;
- good governance relating to artificial intelligence, robotics and related technologies, including the data used or produced by such technologies.
Institutional control
Each Member State should designate an independent public body to monitor the application of the Regulation and to carry out risk and compliance assessments and certification.
Coordination at Union level should be ensured by the Commission and/or the competent Union institutions, bodies, offices and agencies that may be designated for this purpose, in order to ensure consistent application of the Regulation. The Commission should thus: (i) ensure consistent risk assessment of AI, (ii) cooperate with national supervisory bodies; (iii) act as a centre of expertise by promoting the exchange of information on AI; (iv) host a working group on security and defence to examine strategic and investment issues specifically related to the ethical use of artificial intelligence in these areas.