What To Know About Ethics and AI

By: Emma Steele

As our world continues to chase down efficiency and higher productivity, it is important to pause and assess how we plan to use these tools responsibly. Artificial intelligence (AI) is actively transforming the way organizations do business and without ethical clarity, it could result in transformation for the worse.

Let’s discuss how what AI is, how it is being used in, and evaluate it from an ethical perspective.

Understand AI

At the core, AI is a network of computer systems designed to solve problems in a way that mimics human reasoning. These computer systems must initially be taught by humans, which allows it to think and make informed decisions on its own. Over time, AI can continually improve itself by learning from data and experiences. This is called machine and deep learning.

Ethics and Issues To Be Aware Of

With any new technology comes a learning journey and considering potential risks. Ethical missteps can have irreversible impacts on your organization, its client-base, and the industry.

Privacy: AI thrives off of data. The more data it has, the more accurate it is going to be. Because of this insatiable data-hunger, invasion of privacy becomes a big challenge to navigate. User consent has a opportunity to become unclear or more easily muddled. Trust is what maintains a clientele base. Without it, there is no business. Holding your organization to the utmost standards of protecting its clients’ confidentiality and private information is not only essential, but illegal to do otherwise.

Bias and Inaccuracy: As we mentioned earlier, AI continually improves from existing data, and existing data contains bias and is not always 100% truthful (whether intensional or not). While this may be an improved area in the future as AI becomes more refined, we must be cautious with the level of confidence that we place in AI to give us responses that is not littered with various opinions and/or false information.

Transparency: While it may be obvious to consumers right now when they are interacting with a bot versus a human representative, it is likely this will not be the case in the future. People have the right to know when they are interacting with AI. If your organization chooses to integrate AI into any of its business operations (this includes both client facing and internal processes), disclose is a nonnegotiable. Trust and credibility will be breached, especially because of the technology’s infancy.

To sum it up, we cannot ignore AI and therefore, we cannot ignore the ethic considerations that come with it. Our goal with using AI is to become more efficient in our work to improve a customer’s experience, not to deceive them. Consider the following best practicing when implementing AI into your organization.

  1. Data audits for bias: Conducting regular audits for your AI tools keeps flawed data at bay. Especially consider your CRM: the last thing you want is false information in your client basis! Data audits keep practices fair, processes smooth, and work honest.
  2. Privacy/Personalization balance: This is specifically for anyone in marketing- AI is a great tool for consumer personalization, however it can become invasive. For example, a customer’s browsing history vs their financial status, health information, and location are very different types of data. Private information is to be kept off limits, unless very explicit consent is given otherwise.
  3. Operate with an ethical framework: As AI will continue to evolve, you and your organization will need to stay informed. This helps with not only understanding how you can be best implementing it, but also so that you can ensure your organization is complying with all regulatory requirements. Because this is a technology that will be constantly changing, developing a baseline framework can bring consistency and accountability. Incorporate items such as data handling guidelines, bias presentation, and transparency to help prevent unnecessary challenges.

 

Resources: https://www.investopedia.com/how-small-businesses-can-use-ai-tools-8609366#:~:text=AI%20tools%20can%20offer%20small,marketing%2C%20security%2C%20and%20recruitment.

 

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