the report reads<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n“The OIPC is already reviewing privacy impact assessments concerning the use of AI by entities subject to our privacy laws.”<\/p>\n
The use of automated diagnostic tools, or models that make decisions about resource allocation in hospitals\u00a0are\u00a0examples of how people\u00a0might\u00a0encounter the employment of AI in health care.<\/p>\n
Attard-Frost said people would likely want to see those tools have stringent design standards, as well as oversight and accountability.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Chris Stinner, assistant commissioner for strategic initiatives and information management with the OIPC,\u00a0said that scribe tools are becoming increasingly popular in health care as well.<\/p>\n
The solution lies in\u00a0toeing the line between benefit and risk, he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“The last thing everybody wants, and I think we can agree on that, is for Alberta to become a poster child of a botched AI adoption or \u2026[for] Alberta to be added to the list of things gone horribly wrong when it comes to AI,” Stinner said.<\/p>\n
Despite other privacy and health information legislation that exists in Alberta, it’s important to have legislation that specifically pertains to AI,\u00a0Attard-Frost said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
If you leave decisions to AI with no oversight, the potential speed and scale at which things can go wrong is “qualitatively\u00a0different” than the risks even 10 years ago, she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Training a large-scale, enterprise-level AI system requires a mountain of data: think mostly pictures and text. In health care, think pictures of people’s\u00a0faces, or their medical conditions that present physically.<\/p>\n
Stinner said anyone, including those working in the public sector, should be careful about what data is used to train an AI system.<\/p>\n
“Right now, we’re in a situation where there are no set standards as to how the data could be anonymized or de-identified, or how synthetic data could be derived from actual personal information or health information,” he said.<\/p>\n
“So one of the things that is\u00a0sorely needed is agreed-upon standards and principles that ensure reliability.”<\/p>\n
The rewards<\/p>\n
While there are considerable risks concerning privacy and the training of AI in Alberta, Attard-Frost said on the other side of that is a potential boon for the health-care system in the province.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“You could be able to diagnose diseases more accurately,” she said. “You could be able to expand access to health-care services.”<\/p>\n
Attard-Frost\u00a0said that diagnostic services and prescription filling\u00a0for lower-risk illnesses could be possible.<\/p>\n
“I know a lot of what we’ve been talking about seems like there’s all these risks, right? But the reason that we want to try to mitigate the risk is to be able to potentially benefit from increased access to service, increased efficiency of services, increased quality of life, health outcomes.”<\/p>\n
Stinner agrees.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“We recognize and appreciate the\u00a0promises of AI, the promises both in the productivity gains for the health-care sector, efficiency, accuracy and then the positive impact this could have on the Alberta patient,” he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
What’s next?<\/p>\n
Federally, there is still much uncharted territory in the field of AI. Evan Solomon is Canada’s first minister of\u00a0AI and digital innovation. Before he took on that role, a proposed\u00a0Artificial Intelligence and Data Act (AIDA) died on the order paper ahead of the federal election in the spring.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“There hasn’t been too many more specifics from the new government about what their regulatory approach is going to be,” Attard-Frost said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“I think there’s an opportunity for provincial governments to step in, kind of fill that regulatory gap in the meantime and start thinking about consulting the public \u2014\u00a0creating regulation that serves their provinces in the absence of really strong federal direction on AI regulation.”<\/p>\n
Gauthier said in his statement that Alberta’s Ministry of Technology\u00a0is looking forward to working with the OIPC as it moves ahead and monitors regulatory developments across the country.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Alberta wants the provincial government\u00a0to create a regulatory framework…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":110082,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[62,276,277,49,48,61],"class_list":["post-110081","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110081","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110081"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110081\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/110082"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110081"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}