National foreword

This Published Document is the UK implementation of ISO/IEC TR 24368:2022.

The UK participation in its preparation was entrusted to Technical Committee ART/1, Artificial Intelligence.

A list of organizations represented on this committee can be obtained on request to its committee manager.

Contractual and legal considerations

This publication has been prepared in good faith, however no representation, warranty, assurance or undertaking (express or implied) is or will be made, and no responsibility or liability is or will be accepted by BSI in relation to the adequacy, accuracy, completeness or reasonableness of this publication. All and any such responsibility and liability is expressly disclaimed to the full extent permitted by the law.

This publication is provided as is, and is to be used at the recipient’s own risk.

The recipient is advised to consider seeking professional guidance with respect to its use of this publication.

This publication is not intended to constitute a contract. Users are responsible for its correct application.

This publication is not to be regarded as a British Standard.

Compliance with a Published Document cannot confer immunity from legal obligations.

This Published Document was published under the authority of the Standards Policy and Strategy Committee on 30 September 2022.

Foreword

ISO (the International Organization for Standardization) and IEC (the International Electrotechnical Commission) form the specialized system for worldwide standardization. National bodies that are members of ISO or IEC participate in the development of International Standards through technical committees established by the respective organization to deal with particular fields of technical activity. ISO and IEC technical committees collaborate in fields of mutual interest. Other international organizations, governmental and non-governmental, in liaison with ISO and IEC, also take part in the work.

The procedures used to develop this document and those intended for its further maintenance are described in the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 1. In particular, the different approval criteria needed for the different types of document should be noted. This document was drafted in accordance with the editorial rules of the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2 (see www.iso.org/directives or www.iec.ch/members_experts/refdocs).

Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this document may be the subject of patent rights. ISO and IEC shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights. Details of any patent rights identified during the development of the document will be in the Introduction and/or on the ISO list of patent declarations received (see www.iso.org/patents) or the IEC list of patent declarations received (see https://patents.iec.ch).

Any trade name used in this document is information given for the convenience of users and does not constitute an endorsement.

For an explanation of the voluntary nature of standards, the meaning of ISO specific terms and expressions related to conformity assessment, as well as information about ISO's adherence to the World Trade Organization (WTO) principles in the Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) see www.iso.org/iso/foreword.html. In the IEC, see www.iec.ch/understanding-standards.

This document was prepared by Joint Technical Committee ISO/IEC JTC 1, Information technology, Subcommittee SC 42, Artificial intelligence.

Any feedback or questions on this document should be directed to the user’s national standards body. A complete listing of these bodies can be found at www.iso.org/members.html and www.iec.ch/national-committees.

Introduction

Artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to revolutionise the world and carry a plethora of benefits for societies, organizations and individuals. However, AI can introduce substantial risks and uncertainties. Professionals, researchers, regulators and individuals need to be aware of the ethical and societal concerns associated with AI systems and applications.

Potential ethical concerns in AI are wide ranging. Examples of ethical and societal concerns in AI include privacy and security breaches to discriminatory outcomes and impact on human autonomy. Sources of ethical and societal concerns include but are not limited to:

unauthorized means or measures of collection, processing or disclosing personal data;
the procurement and use of biased, inaccurate or otherwise non-representative training data;
opaque machine learning (ML) decision-making or insufficient documentation, commonly referred to as lack of explainability;
lack of traceability;
insufficient understanding of the social impacts of technology post-deployment.

AI can operate unfairly particularly when trained on biased or inappropriate data or where the model or algorithm is not fit-for-purpose. The values embedded in algorithms, as well as the choice of problems AI systems and applications are used for to address, can be intentionally or inadvertently shaped by developers’ and stakeholders’ own worldviews and cognitive bias.

Future development of AI can expand existing systems and applications to grow into new fields and increase the level of automation which these systems have. Addressing ethical and societal concerns has not kept pace with the rapid evolution of AI. Consequently, AI designers, developers, deployers and users can benefit from flexible input on ethical frameworks, AI principles, tools and methods for risk mitigation, evaluation of ethical factors, best practices for testing, impact assessment and ethics reviews. This can be addressed through an inclusive, interdisciplinary, diverse and cross-sectoral approach, including all AI stakeholders, aided by International Standards that address issues arising from AI ethical and societal concerns, including work by Joint Technical Committee ISO/IEC JTC 1, SC 42.

1 Scope

This document provides a high-level overview of AI ethical and societal concerns.

In addition, this document:

provides information in relation to principles, processes and methods in this area;
is intended for technologists, regulators, interest groups, and society at large;
is not intended to advocate for any specific set of values (value systems).

This document includes an overview of International Standards that address issues arising from AI ethical and societal concerns.

2 Normative references

3 Terms and definitions

4 Overview

4.1 General

4.2 Fundamental sources

4.3 Ethical frameworks

5 Human rights practices

5.1 General

6 Themes and principles

6.1 General

6.2 Description of key themes and associated principles

7 Examples of practices for building and using ethical and socially acceptable AI

7.1 Aligning internal process to AI principles

7.2 Considerations for ethical review framework

8 Considerations for building and using ethical and socially acceptable AI

8.1 General

8.2 Non-exhaustive list of ethical and societal considerations

Bibliography

PD ISO/IEC TR 24368:2022

Information technology. Artificial intelligence. Overview of ethical and societal concerns

Current

Published:

30 Sep 2022