Government releases 'guardrails' on AI

The federal government has unveiled what it calls 'guardrails' to protect people from potential harms in the rise of artificial intelligence.

Transcript

00:00Research that we're releasing today from the National AI Centre shows that nearly 80% of

00:07businesses in Australia think they're doing the right thing, but only around 30% are putting

00:13in place the responsible practices required to use AI.

00:17So what we need to do is create that bridge between best intention and best practice.

00:23That's what we're trying to do with the work we're releasing today around the guardrails,

00:27which is identify the risks and make business aware of those risks and then show them the

00:31guardrails, the ways in which they can deal with those risks.

00:36People get that AI can do a lot of good things, but clearly the community is concerned about

00:42the risks and we need to, I think it's the job of governments working with businesses

00:47to respond to that concern and put in place the things that will give the public comfort

00:52around the use of AI and if we do that, and using that technology, there's a lot of benefit

00:58that can come out of that.

00:59It's really important to point out that not all AI is used in a bad or negative way.

01:04It does improve people's lives, but there are some areas that are high risk.

01:09If it's used in a way that impacts, for example, your hiring or firing of people, if it impacts

01:14on your legal rights, if it causes potentially physical or mental impact, and it has wider

01:23severe impacts on society, those are the type of things that we're highlighting as high

01:28risk.

01:29And then we outline through the guardrails ways in which businesses can actually deal

01:33with that risk.

01:35And it's important that developers, deployers of the technology start to have those guardrails

01:40in place.

01:42We don't think that there is a right to self-regulation anymore.

01:46I think we've passed that threshold.

01:48We do need technology firms in particular to demonstrate that they are putting in place

01:54the practices to build community confidence in the way that the technology is used.