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by
A Lily Bit
March 19, 2024
from
ALilyBit Website
European
Parliament Approves
'Artificial
Intelligence Act,'
ushering in Mass
Surveillance
in the Name of
"Public Safety"...
In a move that rings with
Orwellian undertones, the
European Parliament has propelled the
Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) Act
from its conceptual cradle in 2021 to the precipice of legal
reality, transforming what was once a bulwark against the tide of
biometric surveillance into its standard-bearer.
This legislation, which is poised to be unleashed upon the European
populace this May following the Council of the EU's sanctification,
stands as a testament not to the protection of individual freedoms,
but rather to their calculated erosion, set to fully manifest by
2025.
The European Union, with a flourish
of self-congratulation, has heralded the enactment of the AI Act as
a milestone in legislative history, a protector of the common good.
They claim it as a masterpiece of regulation,
designed to shepherd AI's vast potential while reining in the
sprawling tentacles of law enforcement's identification systems.
According to the EU's glowing narrative, this act is the
harbinger of safety, compliance, and a renaissance of
innovation, promising to shield the bedrock of European values -
fundamental rights, democracy, the rule of law, and environmental
integrity - from the shadow of high-risk AI technologies.
Yet, beneath the surface of these grand declarations lurks a
disconcerting reality.
This act, for all its ostensible safeguards,
emboldens a framework that,
could readily morph into a surveillance
apparatus, veiled under the guise of progress and innovation.
The EU's portrayal of the AI Act as a
balancing act between innovation and individual freedoms glosses
over the grim prospect of its dual use, as both,
This legislation raises the specter of a future
where the watchful eyes of AI are interwoven into the
fabric of daily life, under the banner of "public safety and
order"...
It prompts us to question the true cost of
innovation, particularly when it encroaches upon the sanctity of our
personal freedoms and privacy.
Are we, as citizens of the digital age,
prepared to navigate the murky waters of this new reality, where
the lines between protection and surveillance are increasingly
blurred...?
The European Union posits the AI Act as a
cornerstone of its leadership in the digital domain, yet one cannot
help but ponder if this leadership comes at the expense of the very
ideals it seeks to protect.
The MEPs from the Pirate parties stand as vehement dissenters
against this legislative current, casting their votes into the
stormy seas of opposition.
Their critique hinges on the murky trilogue
negotiations, a tripartite dialogue among,
-
the European Parliament
-
the European Commission
-
the Council of the EU,
...that, in their view, clouded the legislative
process in opacity.
This lack of transparency, they argue, has not only diluted the
original intent of the AI Act but has mutated it into a
vehicle that sanctions the deployment of unreliable facial
surveillance and recognition technologies across the public sphere.
MEP
Patrick Breyer's
words paint a dire picture of these amendments,
implicating them as the keystones in the construction of a
surveillance architecture underpinned by error-riddled technologies
and dubious AI practices:
"The AI Act is a disappointment to me.
There is a clear need for rules on artificial
intelligence.
However, the current form that has emerged
from the negotiations with national governments falls short of
what it should have done.
The national governments have inserted a
section that de facto creates a legal framework for widespread
snooping on people by biometric cameras.
Such cameras, equipped with artificial
intelligence, are able to recognize people's faces and thus keep
track of who has been where, when, and with whom.
The AI Act should have banned such an
Orwellian tool, but instead it explicitly legalizes it.
That's an invasion of privacy that Pirates
will never raise a hand for. It's a shame, because the AI Act
has also its positives.
I'm for example glad that I was able to
negotiate rules for so-called e-proctoring.
Programs that are used to check on students
when they take exams online. If the artificial intelligence is
poorly trained, it can evaluate, for example, noise from the
hallway in a dorm as cheating.
Given the impact this can have on a young
person's life, it's worth keeping an eye on and making sure the
program works as it should.
Unfortunately, in the end, when it comes to
the AI Act, the negatives outweigh the positives."
Patrick Breyer
Breyer's alarm extends to the broader arsenal of
surveillance tools now at the beck and call of the EU government.
He casts these instruments - ranging from
real-time surveillance of public places to racial classification
systems powered by a brand of AI that flirts with pseudoscience - as
the harbinger of an authoritarian tide, threatening to
submerge the democratic foundations of Europe under the waters of a
high-tech surveillance state.
Echoing Breyer's sentiments, MEP
Marcel Kolaja of the Czech
Pirate Party articulates a similar disillusionment with the act.
Kolaja denounces the legislative encroachments
made by national governments within the act, perceiving them as the
silent architects of a legal edifice that legitimizes mass
surveillance on an unprecedented scale.
The AI Act, in his eyes, had a pivotal opportunity to
relegate the dystopian specter of AI-powered biometric surveillance
to the realm of forbidden technologies.
Instead, it has chosen to embrace this Orwellian
tool with open arms, sanctioning the use of AI-equipped cameras that
intrusively map out the intricate patterns of human movement and
association.
Such is the landscape painted by these voices of dissent within the
European Parliament.
They challenge us to peer beyond the facade of
regulatory progress to question the principles that guide our march
towards an increasingly digitized future.
In their critique lies a call to the citizenry of Europe and beyond:
to vigilantly guard the bastions of privacy
and personal freedom against the encroaching shadows of
surveillance...
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