Response to the Australian Human Rights Commission Discussion Paper: Technology and Human Rights
Response to the Human Rights Commission Discussion Paper
Will Bateman and Julia Powles
In this submission, Dr Will Bateman (with Dr Julia Powles of the University of Western Australia) responded to the Australian Human Rights Commission’s (AHRC) Discussion Paper on Technology and Human Rights. While the submission was generally supportive of the AHRC’s efforts to date, Dr Bateman and Dr Powles contended that it could be significantly improved in three areas.The first concerned the balance of human rights and economic development (or technological innovation). A strong theme of the AHRC’s discussion paper was that regulatory approaches to artificial intelligence (AI) must recognise the potential contribution which AI can make to economic development, resulting in proposals to include self-regulation and cost-benefit analyses in human rights regulations of AI. The submission urged the AHRC to exercise caution in pursuing those proposals in light of the statutory duty on the AHRC to protect the indivisibility of human rights.The second area for improvement concerned detailed legal proposals concerning the use of AI by government agencies. The submission contended that a statutory cause of action for serious invasion of privacy must be expressly remove any immunity enjoyed by government officials. They also submitted that the AHRC must strengthen all its legal proposals to include strongly enforceable remedies for people who are subject to the use of AI by government without their knowledge or consent.The third area of improvement concerned the viability of the AHRC’s proposal for the establishment of an ‘AI Safety Commissioner’. The submission urged the AHRC to consider whether that proposal was appropriate in terms of the statutory mandate to protect the indivisibility of human rights (rather than ‘safety’) and encouraged a deeper consideration of the powers of a genuine safety commissioner or authority for AI, including powers of investigation, prevention, and correction proportionate to Australian bodies in other industries.