Artificial intelligence will affect a wide range of public services

Georgia lawmakers may or may not draft legislation this summer and fall to establish national standards to regulate emerging artificial intelligence (AI) technologies.

But one certainty emerged clearly during a state Senate study committee’s inaugural hearing late last month: AI will have a profound impact on a wide range of government policy areas, from economic development to health care, education, public safety and transportation.

“This is going to have an impact and change things like never before,” said Sen. John Albers, a Roswell Republican who chairs the Senate Study Committee on Artificial Development.

One area of ​​public policy that is already being affected by AI is elections. We are already seeing “deep fakes” in political ads, which digitally alter a candidate’s physical appearance or voice to make them say or do something that the real person did not say or do.

With deep fakes in political advertising being one of the earliest manifestations of AI, some state lawmakers have made the practice the focus of the General Assembly’s first attempt to rein in the industry.

A bill introduced this year in the Georgia House of Representatives called for criminalizing the use of false messages in political ads. House Bill 986 passed overwhelmingly in the House but was rejected by the state Senate.

The effects AI is expected to have on public policy are already starting to be felt. In the public safety arena, AI is already capable of receiving 911 calls and dispatching emergency services, Albers said.

“No one will ever be left on hold and not have an immediate response,” he said.

Similarly, the major role AI will play in transportation will first be seen in the development of autonomous vehicles, drone deliveries, and technologies that help cities manage traffic flow. Eventually, AI will guide transportation planners in their decisions about widening highways or building bridges.

Albers said AI would also revolutionize education.

“We’ve been teaching the same way for 85 years,” he said. “The world has changed eight times in that time.”

In healthcare, AI’s data consolidation capabilities could help researchers cure cancer, Albers said.

While much of the General Assembly’s attention on AI is focused on its public policy applications, lawmakers could also actively encourage the private sector by creating incentives to promote the use of the technology as a tool for economic development.

“We have a real opportunity to create a massive number of (commercial) startups in this state,” said Pascal Van Hentenryck, a Georgia Tech professor, director of Tech-AI, the university’s AI hub, and a member of the study committee.

Albers said any action the General Assembly takes on AI regulation must also have a fairness component.

“We don’t want to exclude people from this project,” he said. “We want to overcome the digital divide.”

Albers said the study committee will hold seven or eight hearings this summer and fall, some of them outside the Capitol. One of those sessions will be held in Augusta, home to the Georgia Cyber ​​Innovation & Training Center.

The committee is expected to release its recommendations for bills by December 1. If no bill is introduced, the panel will submit a report to the full Senate.

This story comes to Rough Draft through a media partnership with Capitol Beat.