As Malta aspires to become the Ultimate AI launchpad, the Parliamentary Secretariat for Financial Services, Digital Economy and Innovation issued its consultation paper and vison on how Government wishes to develop an Ethical AI Framework to achieve its purpose and create a regulatory and innovation ecosystem that promotes the design and operation of trustworthy AI.
The purpose of the Malta Ethical AI Framework is to establish an ethical code, a set of guiding principles and trustworthy AI governance together with control practices that can serve as the foundation for the design and implementation of safe AI.
In developing the Malta Ethical AI Framework, the Government has the following four objectives:
Malta plans to have an AI ecosystem that promotes an acceleration in the achievement of the benefits of AI, whilst minimising its risks. This will require that Malta maintains a fine balance between opposing factors including:
In developing the Malta Ethical AI Framework, the Government has established four Ethical AI Principles for establishing trustworthy AI which are in alignment with the EU Ethics Guidelines for Trustworthy AI.
The achievement of the above objectives is already encoded, in part, in existing legal and regulatory requirements and therefore they should be considered in relation to mandatory compliance required as a function of laws and regulations, as well as enhanced ethical expectations by stakeholders.
To achieve the Ethical AI Guidelines and Trustworthy AI Requirements AI practitioners will be required to leverage existing control practices, while also developing new control practices that address the unique trust conditions necessary for AI including having:
The plan of is to lead to a trustworthy certification regime of AI and a healthy ecosystem where developers work in a safe and ethical environment and users’ rights and interests are adequately safeguarded.
The public consultation can be found here: (https://malta.ai/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Malta_Towards_Ethical_and_Trustworthy_AI.pdf).
Feedback is urged in particular on the following considerations:
Feedback can be sent by email to fsdei.opm@gov.mt by 6th September 2019.
For more information, please contact Dr Ian Gauci on igauci@gtgadvocates.com
This article is not intended to impart legal advice and readers are asked to seek verification of statements made before acting on them.