EU artificial intelligence regulation risks undermining social safety net

The European Union's (EU) proposed plan to regulate the use of artificial intelligence (AI) threatens to undermine the bloc's social safety net, and is ill-equipped to protect people from surveillance and discrimination, according to a report by Human Rights Watch. Social security support across Europe is increasingly administered by AI-powered algorithms, which are being used by governments to allocate life-saving benefits, provide job support and control access to a variety of social services, said Human Rights Watch in its 28-page report, How the EU's flawed artificial intelligence regulation endangers the social safety net. Drawing on case studies from Ireland, France, the Netherlands, Austria, Poland and the UK, the non-governmental organisation (NGO) found that Europe's trend towards automation is discriminating against people in need of social security support, compromising their privacy, and making it harder for them to obtain government assistance. It added that while the EU's Artificial Intelligence Act (AIA) proposal, which was published in April 2021, does broadly acknowledge the risks associated with AI, "it does not meaningfully protect people's rights to social security and an adequate standard of living". "In particular, its narrow safeguards neglect how existing inequities and failures to adequately protect rights – such as the digital divide, social security cuts, and discrimination in the labour market – shape the design of automated systems, and become embedded by them."