Let the Buyer Beware. AI is Your Responsibility, Not Theirs

AI gives us a massive array of different advantages, but with that advantage comes a fair amount of risk. In the face of all of this major excitement and all the wonderful things that AI can do, it's very sobering to have to assess the kinds of risks involved in every aspect of it. Did you know that you and your organization, regardless of where you bought it and who created it.. are solely responsible for how your AI works and interacts?

You need to take the proper steps to assess the risk that is inherent in any kind of artificial intelligence use.

Without taking those steps, however, you open yourself and your organization to a lot of vulnerability. There are no small threats associated with AI and its use.

How should you approach those risks?

According to SAP Insights there are six key places to begin and everyone needs to take a close look at these and assess their own risk.

--Be very clear what you want the AI for prior to buying it. All AI has some measure of liability so make sure that you are taking the right risks. This will help you to avoid buying a bot to use for one thing and then finding out that you're using it for things that it wasn't designed to do.

--Interact closely and work directly with your legal team prior to investing in the AI. You will both need to understand the risk and make an assessment as to whether or not you can take on the scope of responsibility that is associated with the artificial intelligence that you will be using. One example is that if a financial group were to work with AI to prevent fraud, they will need to ensure compliance as well as to ensure lack of bias in the AI.

--Know and understand the lifecycle of Artificial Intelligence. You will have an install date but you will also have an end date. There is a lifecycle to everything. It will give you clear information about when you should be monitoring and when you can stop.

-- Don't fail to ask every question that you can think of of the vendor. Even if you feel that the questions make you look foolish, ask them anyway. Understanding what you are getting and how it is going to accomplish what it does is imperative. If you just buy the black box you could end up with a massive legal bill for it. As questions about how the system was devised, how it is maintained and how it meets the GDPR or other provisions against harmful profiling, even if you are not in the UK.

-- Make sure that you completely understand what you are getting and how it is working. Find out how the cybersecurity provisions work and don't be satisfied with pat answers. Get it all in writing and get real answers to your questions or don't buy.

--Keep humans involved. While it may seem counterintuitive to have people working with AI, the reality is that keeping humans in the decision processes can help to guard against bad AI results that will put you and your company in jeopardy. One example is that if you are using AI in a hiring task, have a human review if the most qualified person was hired or if they got screened out and if they did get screened out, find out why. Alter the data if necessary to prevent bias.

Trying to imagine and prevent everything that could happen may seem like a difficult, daunting task but doing your best and making sure that due diligence has been done will go a long way toward protecting your company against long term harm.

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