India-backed landmark resolution on AI safeguards adopted unanimously at UNGA

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In a rare show of global unanimity, all 193 member countries of the United Nations joined together to adopt a landmark resolution backed by India aiming to keep the world safe from the excesses of artificial intelligence.

The General Assembly’s resolution passed unanimously on Thursday stressed “the urgency of achieving global consensus on safe, secure and trustworthy artificial intelligence systems” in the face of “potential risk for accidents and compound threats from malicious actors”.

India’s Permanent Representative Ruchira Kamboj said in a post on X after its adoption, “Happy to co-sponsor the Resolution on AI”.

The resolution was proposed by the United States and the State Department’s factsheet about it said it builds on several initiatives, including the Global Partnership on AI (GPAI) Summit hosted by India in December.

The resolution emphasises the role of AI in promoting global development while making sure it protects private data and human rights and is tested for vulnerabilities before deployment.

The resolution, which calls for the development of regulations for “safe, secure and trustworthy” AI systems, also acknowledges the importance of domestic priorities and national and “ subnational” policies in framing them.

The unanimity at the UN underscores the fears over AI’s potential to disrupt politics and society through deep fakes and spreading misinformation, and its more sinister capabilities in warfare, development of weapons and disrupting economies.

“In a moment in which the world is seeming to be agreeing on little, perhaps the most quietly radical aspect of this resolution is the wide consensus forged in the name of advancing progress”, US Permanent Representative Linda Thomas-Greenfield said of its significance.

She said she worked with over 120 countries for several months to achieve the consensus and had put the resolution’s draft through several edits.

For wider acceptance and tamping down dissidence, the resolution highlights AI’s role in helping developing nations, especially the poorest, and calls for bridging the digital divide among and within nations that AI could widen.

An important goal of the resolution is deploying AI for “achieving sustainable development in its three dimensions – economic, social and environmental – with specific consideration of developing countries and leaving no one behind”.

The resolution calls for measures to “promote innovation for the internationally interoperable identification, classification, evaluation, testing, prevention and mitigation of vulnerabilities and risks during the design and development and prior to the deployment and use of artificial intelligence systems”.

This article appeared on southasiamonitor.org on March 22, 2024. Used under special arrangement with South Asia Monitor.