Transparency Seems to Die a Death at the Government’s AI Summit
Published in the Byline Times.
Extract from the piece:
‘The Government is hosting a high-profile, much advertised AI Safety Summit in November. Among those rumoured to be attending are King Charles, alongside Justin Trudeau, Ursula von der Leyen, Emmanuel Macron, and Kamala Harris.
But beyond media speculation and the bare-bones programme summary (released just last week), there is no clarity on the list of attendees, exact agenda, expected policy outcomes – and seemingly no way to find out.
The Government claims that the summit “will bring together key countries, as well as leading technology organisations, academia and civil society to inform rapid national and international action at the frontier of artificial intelligence”.
In reality, the summit seems to have been hijacked by Big Tech players, and there is no transparency around the tech industry’s role and influence in the summit. Efforts by The Citizens – a non-profit working in the space of democracy, data rights and disinformation – to find out, have come to no fruition.’