The risks of new technologies

Companies today are going through a peculiar historical moment, called by many as Industry 4.0 or the Fourth Industrial Revolution. This is, in fact, a time of great innovations and disruptions in the business world, which are, in large part, the outcome of human creativity regarding the practical application of new technologies - especially digital ones. Indeed, today everything seems to revolve around IT, as what can be seen is that these next-generation technologies are, to a greater or lesser degree, all digitally oriented.

The fact is that the use of technological devices such as 3D printing, drones, blockchain, internet of things, 5G and artificial intelligence (just to name a few) does bring risks inherent to their use in products, services and new businesses in general. And this is especially valid from the long-term perspective: that is, what will be the longer-term effect of these technologies, which are still very recent in development?

It is clear that the industry as a whole takes great care in using new variables in business that represent risks and uncertainties. There are a whole series of controls and checks that are used to try to filter out, as much as possible, adverse, harmful to human health or unwanted effects in general. It is part of the routine of industrial engineering to make use of tests, experiments, prototyping, verifications and checks of all kinds to try to guarantee that everything that could represent a relevant risk is properly treated. In fact, in the risk management discipline, it is about recognizing that, depending on the type of enterprise that is being explored, sometimes it is possible to completely eliminate the risks, but at other times this is simply not possible: risk is, in many cases, inherent to the business. For example, trading in the financial market can lead to significant equity losses - while it can lead to gains far above-average. Cars can injure and kill people - but they can also fulfill their role of serving as an important mode of transport. There are those who rightly state that the gain is proportional to the risk. Going further, it is also interesting to reflect on the saying that "the difference between a medicine and a poison is the dosage".

Finally, it must be recognized that, however exhaustive the tests, controls and all forms of examination of recent technologies, created, for example, a decade ago (or even less than that!) have been, long-term effects have yet to were observed for the sheer impossibility of granting them a deadline that has not yet elapsed. In other words, how to be sure what happens 50 years from now with a technological innovation that appeared, for example, a few months or years ago?

In practice, many of these medium-long-term effects will, of course, materialize in due course - and often gradually. This, at least, is the good news: if the unexpected does occur, at least it often comes at such a speed that timely detection and response action are still viable.

In sum, an analogy here is quite pertinent: taking to reflect on that maxim that "the price of freedom is eternal vigilance" (pronounced first by John Curran, but later somewhat eternalized by Thomas Jefferson) - of course, the context of the sentence is about democracy, about politics. It is about the need to continuously monitor events happening in society and between nations so that people are able to identify threats proactively and in their early stages. In this way, events that could lead to social instability, revolutions and loss of established rights would be neutralized in a timely manner. Now, make a proper comparison with the world of new technologies and their risks: it seems to fit like a glove too! "The price of the freedom to innovate with new technologies is eternal vigilance in the face of its risks."