Member Article

As global regulators continue to grapple with the challenges of developing and implementing effective Artificial Intelligence (AI) regulation, and with AI sitting high on the agenda for Rishi Sunak’s meeting this week with President Biden, the UK Government has announced that it will be hosting a global AI Summit later this year.

The summit is intended to bring together international governments and AI industry leaders to:

“consider the risks of AI, including frontier systems, and discuss how they can be mitigated through internationally coordinated action… [and] …provide a platform for countries to work together on further developing a shared approach to mitigate these risks.”

Given the perceived hardening in the UK’s view on the need for robust AI regulation (or at least guardrails) since publication of its much-anticipated White Paper on AI in March, and following the Prime Minister’s recent round-table discussion with AI industry leaders including OpenAI and Google DeepMind, the summit is a further indication that the Government is positioning the UK as a bridge between the EU, US and other major trading blocs, and as a global hub for AI technologies.

The summit reinforces many of the themes of international collaboration that have been such a prominent feature of many of the legislative regimes developed to date. There remain questions, however, as to whether the lighter-touch and sector-specific approach to AI regulation outlined in the UK’s White Paper will survive unscathed against the backdrop of increasing demands, including from the major AI providers, for clear and consistent cross-border regulation. 

 

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-to-host-first-global-summit-on-artificial-intelligence

 

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