L’Unesco a annoncé jeudi avoir adopted a premier texte mondial sur l’éthique de l’intelligence artificielle (IA) afin d’essayer d’encadrer ces technologies révolutionnaires, qui font peser des risques fondamentaux sur les sociétés en dépit des nombreuses avancées qu ‘they allow.

“AI technologies can be of great use to humanity” and “all countries can benefit”, but “they also raise fundamental ethical concerns”, underlines in its preamble the 28-page recommendation, ratified by the 193 Member States of the UNESCO.

There is “the need to ensure the transparency and intelligibility of the operation of the algorithms and the data from which they have been trained”, because they can affect “human rights and fundamental freedoms, gender equality, democracy”, continues this International organization. based in Paris.

Almost absent at the beginning of the millennium, AI has been grafting itself into our lives: it decides what news we will read on our phone, what movies will we broadcast, what routes the guidance systems will take us …

But the algorithms that allow it to function have also been misused in recent years, illustrating its dangers.

Facebook has been at the center of several scandals. The British firm Cambridge Analytica has been accused of having misappropriated the data of the American giant to influence politically the referendum that led to Brexit in the United Kingdom, and the election of Donald Trump in the United States.

More recently, Facebook has been accused of polarizing corporations by overexposing extremist or conspiratorial content.

As a result of the work begun in 2018, the Unesco recommendation highlights values ​​- “Respect, protection and promotion of human rights”, “diversity and inclusion”, promotion of “peaceful societies” and of the environment – which the member states undertake. to respect.

It also lists the actions that signatories will need to take, in particular establishing a legislative tool to frame and monitor AI, “ensuring the full security of personal and sensitive data” or even educating the masses about it.

Russia, China and Iran, states regularly accused of obstructing human rights, have signed a text that UNESCO recognizes is an “incentive device” without the possibility of sanctions. The United States and Israel, very active in new technologies, are not part of UNESCO.

jf / cf / clr

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