Applying intelligence to AI

I call it the 'Terminator Effect', based on the premise that thinking machines took over the world.

- David Harvey

On July 24, Technology Minister Judith Collins announced a gradualist approach to the regulation of artificial intelligence. "We will take a light-touch, proportionate and risk-based approach to AI," the accompanying cabinet paper said. "We already have laws that provide some guardrails; further regulatory intervention should only be considered to unlock innovation or address acute risks."

Rather than the straitjacket of regulation, Collins has asked the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment to create AI guidelines for the public and private sectors.

A proper regulatory approach would be hard to design. Continual disruptive change has been a characteristic of the digital paradigm, no more so than in the field of AI.

However, Victoria University of Wellington senior lecturer Andrew Lensen wrote in the Herald that the government's approach ignores issues such as data privacy, political polarisation and inequities in service delivery, which will escalate without legislative oversight.