OECD Updates AI Principles to Stay Abreast of Rapid Technological Developments

03/05/2024 – The 2024 OECD Ministerial Council Meeting (MCM) has adopted revisions to the landmark OECD Principles on Artificial Intelligence (AI). In response to recent developments in AI technologies, notably the emergence of general-purpose and generative AI, the updated Principles more directly address AI-associated challenges involving privacy, intellectual property rights, safety, and information integrity.

With 47 adherents, including the EU, and a general scope that ensures applicability to AI developments globally, the OECD AI Principles provide a blueprint for policy frameworks on how to address AI risks and shape AI policies. As the first intergovernmental standard on AI, the Principles advocate for AI that is innovative and trustworthy, and that upholds human rights and democratic values.

Since the Principles were first adopted in 2019, the OECD AI Policy Observatory has tracked significant developments:

• Venture capital investments in generative AI startups have increased nine-fold.
• Demand for AI skills has soared by 130%.
• The share of large firms using AI has nearly doubled, now more than four times their smaller counterparts.

These developments coincide with significant policy attention and action, with over 1,000 AI initiatives in more than 70 countries and jurisdictions.

The imperative to develop and deploy AI systems to boost productivity, accelerate scientific research, promote environmental sustainability, and improve healthcare and education while upholding human rights and democratic values is growing. However, risks such as privacy, security, fairness, and well-being are developing at unprecedented speed and scale, turning into real-world harms such as the perpetuation of bias and discrimination, the creation and dissemination of misinformation and disinformation, and the distortion of public discourse and markets.

Key Revisions to the OECD Principles

1. Safety Concerns: Updated Principles ensure that if AI systems risk causing undue harm or exhibit undesired behavior, robust mechanisms and safeguards exist to override, repair, and/or decommission them safely.
2. Information Integrity: Reflecting the growing importance of addressing misinformation and disinformation, the updated Principles safeguard information integrity, especially in the context of generative AI.
3. Responsible Business Conduct: Emphasizes responsible business conduct throughout the AI system lifecycle, involving cooperation with suppliers of AI knowledge and resources, users, and stakeholders.
4. Transparency and Responsible Disclosure: Clarifies the information regarding AI systems that constitute transparency and responsible disclosure.
5. Environmental Sustainability: Explicitly references environmental sustainability, a concern that has grown considerably in importance over the past five years.
6. Interoperable Governance and Policy: Underscores the need for jurisdictions to work together to promote interoperable governance and policy environments for AI, as the number of AI policy initiatives worldwide surges.

“The OECD has helped shape digital policy agendas for decades, through evidence-based recommendations and extensive multilateral and multi-stakeholder cooperation,” said OECD Secretary-General Mathias Cormann. “The OECD AI Principles are a global reference point for AI policymaking, facilitating global policy interoperability and promoting innovation with humans at the centre. The revised OECD AI Principles will provide a blueprint for global interoperability on AI policy and for policymakers to keep pace with technology, by addressing general-purpose and generative AI and their effects on our economies and societies.”

Global Impacts and Future Alignment

The Recommendation of the OECD Council on Artificial Intelligence, which includes the OECD AI Principles, contains definitions that underpin and encourage international interoperability. The Recommendation’s definitions of an AI system and its lifecycle are used around the world, including in the European Union, Japan, and the United States. They also inform the work of the United Nations and EU-US Trade and Technology Council.

The revised Principles reflect the OECD’s continuing commitment to providing guidance on AI policy as the technology advances and impacts society in unprecedented ways.

For more information on the updated AI Principles and how they could shape AI policies globally, visit OECD AI Principles.