Australia to Potentially Ban High-Risk, Social Scoring AI

We want to get the balance right and also allow low-risk AI to flourish unimpeded.

A display for facial recognition and artificial intelligence is seen on monitors at Huawei's Bantian campus on April 26, 2019 in Shenzhen, China. (Kevin Frayer/Getty Images)While commercially successful and a dominant player in 5G, or fifth-generation networking technology, Huawei has faced political headwinds and allegations that its equipment includes so-called backdoors that the U.S. government perceives as a national security. U.S. authorities are also seeking the extradition of Huaweis Chief Financial Officer, Meng Wanzhou, to stand trial in the U.S. on fraud charges. Meng is currently under house arrest in Canada, though Huawei maintains the U.S. case against her is purely political. Despite the U.S. campaign against the company, Huawei is determined to lead the global charge toward adopting 5G wireless networks. It has hired experts from foreign rivals, and invested heavily in R&D to patent key technologies to boost Chinese influence. Photo by Kevin Frayer/Getty Images

A newly established task force will set out to identify the riskiest uses of artificial intelligence, such as social scoring and biometric identification.

Industry and Science Minister Ed Husic on Feb. 14 announced the appointments for the Artificial Intelligence Expert Group, saying that mandatory restrictions and voluntary rules should be used to make sure that AI is used appropriately and without harmful consequences in Australia.