Artificial Intelligence, what if something goes wrong?

Technology is being developed at such a speed, intensity and extent that we find ourselves in the stage defined as Industry 4.0. One of the technologies which growth has been defined by some as exponential is artificial intelligence, especially in the aspect of machine learning. I mean learning that allows machines to adapt and learn without explicit programming to do so.

There are many applications of machine learning: in financial decision-making, in medical diagnoses, in image and voice recognition, or in self-crewed vehicles, to give some examples. However, what happens when technology does not respond as expected. What happens if a machine authorizes a person to access a database by voice that he/she should not know or use? What happens if a vehicle makes a “bad decision” and kills a person? How is responsibility distributed?

The answer to those questions is related to the legal framework and the agreements executed in order to determine responsibility. But the reality is that the Mexican legal framework has not elaborated much on the assignment of civil or criminal responsibility to someone due to the malfunction of a technology that learns and adapts itself. Because of this problem, corporations can face significant risks.

Technologies are being developed at such a speed that there is no yet a legal framework to keep pace. Agreements often deal with services of technology developers, considerations, and intellectual property aspects, but they have scarce information about how responsibilities would be separated in case anything goes wrong.

In Mexico, we have a contractual and non-contractual civil liability scheme that could serve as a framework to generate some contractual clauses that could mitigate civil liability risks in the future. Actually, the analysis of technology-related legal risks seems to be the key to avoid unexpected events in the future. Finding a legal service provider that can mitigate such risks poses a triple challenge.

On the one hand, it is necessary for the legal service provider to be very familiar with the traditional legislative framework and, on the other hand, it is necessary for that provider to identify the operational aspects of the technologies that are connected to the existing legal concepts. All of the foregoing within a framework of principles developed by international organizations (e.g. OECD and UN) or regional authorities such as those of the European Union.

The challenge is to generate a legal environment that allows technology companies to have greater confidence in investing, developing projects and making them available to consumers. If you require any further information about this topic, feel free to contact us.