The UK government confirmed it had no plans to introduce AI-specific legislation in Q2 this year, however, a few months is long time when it comes to AI and there are now reports that work has begun on draft legislation, most likely to address issues relating to large language models rather than AI applications themselves.
The Financial Times released an article speculating that the government may look to make current voluntary agreements to submit large language model (LLM) algorithms to a safety assessment process mandatory. There are also rumblings that the UK will consider amending copyright legislation to allow organisations and individuals to opt out of allowing LLMs to scrape their content.
Recent UK policy developments this year include:
March
A House of Lords Library briefing was published on 18th March 2024 which discusses the key elements of the Artificial Intelligence (Regulation) Bill 2023-24. This is a private members' Bill which, as such, is unlikely to progress. Among other things, it seeks to introduce a new body, the AI Authority, which would have various functions designed to help address AI regulation in the UK. The Bill had its second reading on 22 March.
On 25th March, DSIT published a responsible AI toolkit of guidance developed by the Responsible Technology Adoption Unit (formerly CDEI). It aims to support organisations and practitioners in developing and deploying AI systems safely and responsibly by housing guidance, resources and research in one place. It collates some pre-existing guidance including on AI assurance and will be added to over time. Now added to the toolkit, the government also published guidance on Responsible AI in recruitment. The guidance looks at potential risks and suggests a range of assurance mechanisms to manage them. These include putting an AI governance framework in place, carrying out impact assessments and bias audits, performance testing, risk assessments, model cards, and training and upskilling employees.
27th March, the Institute for Public Policy Research published a report on how generative AI could impact employment in the UK. The report warns that up to 8 million jobs could be at risk due to generative AI and urges the government to develop a jobs-centric industrial strategy to facilitate job transition and ensure the benefits of automation are spread across society.
April
The UK and US AI Safety Institutes signed an MoU on 1 April 2024 aiming to work together on AI safety research. This will include developing tests for advanced AI models and working together to align approaches and evaluation suites for AI models, systems and agents.
11th April, the OECD announced the partnership of its own AI Assurance catalogue which provides a global exchange for AI tools and metrics, with the UK's AI Assurance Portfolio.
11th April, the CMA published an update paper on AI foundation models as part of its review launched in May 2023. The update paper follows an initial report published in September 2023 which outlined proposed principles to guide the development and deployment of foundation models to achieve positive competition and consumer protection outcomes. The update paper looks at key changes since publication of the initial report and confirms the final guiding principles. It also sets out three key risks to competition posed by foundation model AI and looks at how the CMA's proposals will mitigate risk. The CMA proposes stepping up its use of merger control and taking account of developments in foundation model-related markets when deciding on its enforcement priorities for its incoming powers under the DMCC Bill to help mitigate and address risks. The CMA's update paper was accompanied by a technical report published on 16th April. The CMA plans to publish a further update in autumn 2024.
May
The ICO published a third call for evidence on generative AI. This focuses on accuracy of training data and model outputs and closes at 17:00 on 10th May 2024. The call looks at the meaning of accuracy in a generative AI and data protection context and the impact of accuracy as well as the link between purpose and accuracy. It also looks at the impact of training data on accuracy of output.
July
On 26 July 2024, the UK Government released its AI Opportunities Action Plan: terms of reference, which outlines its plan to develop a roadmap towards an AI Bill that will capture the opportunities of AI and harness its potential for economic growth.
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