Can procurement promote trustworthy AI and avoid commercial capture?

The public sector is quickly adopting artificial intelligence (AI) to manage its interactions with citizens and in the provision of public services – for example, using chatbots in official websites, automated processes and call-centres, or predictive algorithms.

There are inherent high stakes risks to this process of public governance digitalisation, such as bias and discrimination, unethical deployment, data and privacy risks, cyber security risks, or risks of technological debt and dependency on proprietary solutions developed by (big) tech companies.

However, as part of the UK Government’s ‘light touch’ approach to digital technology regulation, the adoption of AI in the public sector remains largely unregulated.

In this public lecture, Professor Sanchez-Graells will present the findings of his research funded by the British Academy, where he has analysed how, in this deregulatory context, the existing rules on public procurement fall short of protecting the public interest.

An alternative approach is required to create mechanisms of external independent oversight and mandatory standards to embed trustworthy AI requirements and to mitigate against commercial capture in the acquisition of AI solutions.

This event is in person only, although a recording of the lecture will be made available after the event. The lecture will be followed by a coffee and cake reception.

Host or Publisher Centre for Global Law & Innovation, UoB Law School