Government panel suggests AI incident database, invites comments till January 27

A panel set up by the government in 2023 to look at AI governance has recommended an AI incident database to better understand the actual risks of artificial intelligence, stressing that an inter-ministerial, or a holistic government approach is required to govern AI, an effort that could be spearheaded by the IT ministry and the office of the principal scientific advisor. The report wants MeitY to house a technical advisory body and act as the coordination focal point for this governance group, which should build an AI incident database to understand the “actual incidence of AI-related risks in India”, echoing a similar recommendation by the NITI Aayog in 2021. These AI incidents could include “cyber incidents” and “cyber security incidents” and extend to “adverse or dangerous” outcomes from the use of AI that can disadvantage or harm individuals, businesses, and societies”. They could include “malfunctions, unauthorised outcomes, discriminatory outcomes, unforeseeable outcomes and unexpected emergent behaviour, system failures, privacy violations, physical safety problems, etc.” It said that initially, only public sector organisations using AI systems should mandatorily report to this database while private entities were “encouraged to voluntarily report AI incidents”. The technical secretariat, as per the report, should try to get “voluntary commitments on transparency across the overall AI ecosystem and on baseline commitments for high capability/widely deployed systems” from the industry.