Operationalising AI ethics: barriers, enablers and next steps

Abstract

By mid-2019 there were more than 80 AI ethics guides available in the public domain. Despite this, 2020 saw numerous news stories break related to ethically questionable uses of AI. In part, this is because AI ethics theory remains highly abstract, and of limited practical applicability to those actually responsible for designing algorithms and AI systems. Our previous research sought to start closing this gap between the ‘what’ and the ‘how’ of AI ethics through the creation of a searchable typology of tools and methods designed to translate between the five most common AI ethics principles and implementable design practices. Whilst a useful starting point, that research rested on the assumption that all AI practitioners are aware of the ethical implications of AI, understand their importance, and are actively seeking to respond to them. In reality, it is unclear whether this is the case. It is this limitation that we seek to overcome here by conducting a mixed-methods qualitative analysis to answer the following four questions: what do AI practitioners understand about the need to translate ethical principles into practice? What motivates AI practitioners to embed ethical principles into design practices? What barriers do AI practitioners face when attempting to translate ethical principles into practice? And finally, what assistance do AI practitioners want and need when translating ethical principles into practice?

A Code of Digital Ethics: laying the foundation for digital ethics in a science and technology company

“…Moreover, many ethical "should" questions go beyond the scope usually provided in legal regulations, which provide practitioners mainly with answers to "could" questions. However, finding answers to the ethical questions are important for building and maintaining trust in a company's operations (Morley et al 2021b). Merck has a strong track record of proactively seeking and implementing ethical guidance, especially in the biomedical field which has also often progressed rapidly beyond the scope of current regulation.…”

AI-powered narrative building for facilitating public participation and engagement

“…13 Although ALTAI targeted business and organisations, this tool could be used by governments to self-assess the trustworthiness of their AI systems under development. The main challenges relating to ethical AI point to how algorithms process data to produce evidence and motivate actions [ 58 ] and how ethical principles translate into practice [ 59 ]. Answering those challenges will trickle down to people’s perceptions of ADA.…”

AI Ethics Principles in Practice: Perspectives of Designers and Developers

“…The development and deployment of responsible AI requires users to adopt a largely implicit set of high-level ethics principles into explicit practices. Yet the availability of useful ethical design specifications for AI designers and developers is currently lacking [14], with a recent review highlighting various limitations [16]. Such limitations include the lack of methods that support the proactive design of transparent, explainable and accountable systems, in contrast to the less useful post-hoc explanations of system outputs.…”

“…The limited support for tools available for designers and developers demonstrates a gap in what is available and what is useful for adopting responsible, or ethical, design approaches [14]. The implementation of ethics principles in practice requires an improved understanding of the practices of designers and developers of AI systems, and how they relate to high-level ethics principles.…”

“…A recent report by the Australian Human Rights Commission has recommended introducing legal accountability for both government and public sector uses of AI, as well as establishing an independent AI Safety Commissioner [12]. However, there is still a large gap between high-level AI principles and practical techniques that can be readily used in the design and development of responsible AI systems [13], [14]. Furthermore, ethics principles are just one of a range of governance mechanisms and policy tools necessary to promote ethical development and use of AI technologies.…”