WEF publishes toolkit on artificial intelligence and kids – Western Standard

The World Economic Forum (WEF) published a report titled Artificial Intelligence for Children a toolkit to enable various stakeholders to develop trustworthy artificial intelligence for children and youth.

Children and youth are surrounded by AI in many of the products they use in their daily lives, from social media to education technology, video games, smart toys and speakers. AI determines the videos children watch online, their curriculum as they learn, it says in the reports introduction.

The WEF toolkit was created by a team of academics, business leaders, technologists, and youth leaders. Its purpose is to enable the business sector to create ethical, responsible, and trustworthy AI to support parents, guardians and youth to navigate the AI environment safely.

The toolkit includes a tool for business called the C-suite. It provides actionable frameworks with real-world support to help companies design innovative and responsible AI for young people.

Many companies use AI to differentiate their brands and their products by incorporating it into toys, interactive games, extended reality applications, social media, streaming platforms and educational products. With little more than a patchwork of regulations to guide them, organizations must navigate a sea of privacy and ethics concerns related to data capture and the training and use of AI models. Executive leaders must strike a balance between realizing the potential of AI and helping reduce the risk of harm to children and youth and, ultimately, their brand, the report says.

The C-suite checklist guides business on topics such as full disclosure, systemic bias, age-sensitive user validation, and privacy. These areas are where businesses often fall short in a fast-evolving field where regulatory frameworks struggle to keep up.

The WEF report calls for an AI labelling system that would put a QR code on the box of every product incorporating AI potentially used by children. It would inform consumers, especially parents and guardians, the nature of the contents and possible considerations.

The QR code would share information about the product such as the age-appropriateness; whether it uses a microphone, or camera; whether the product can connect with other users on the internet; if it employs facial or voice recognition or gathers data.

The topic of AI and children is not a subject that has been taken lightly since the advent of AI. In 2017, MIT published a discourse on AIs impact on children and childhood called Hey Google, is it OK if I eat you?

Autonomous technology is becoming more prevalent in our daily lives. We investigated how children perceive this technology by studying how 26 participants (3-10 years old) interact with Amazon Alexa, Google Home, Cozmo, and Julie Chatbot. [The] children answered questions about trust, intelligence, social entity, personality, and engagement. We identify four themes in child-agent interaction: perceived intelligence, identity attribution, playfulness and understanding. Our findings show how different modalities of interaction may change the way children perceive their intelligence in comparison to the agents. We also propose a series of design considerations for future child-agent interaction around voice and prosody, interactive engagement and facilitating understanding, the MIT reports abstract said.

MIT raised concerns at the time that unregulated toys already on the market using AI and an internet connection were and continue to be a serious concern in terms of invasiveness and privacy.

Already, the Internet of Toys is raising privacy and security concerns. Take Mattels Aristotle, for instance. This bot, which is like an Amazon Echo for kids, can record childrens video and audio and has an uninterrupted connection to the internet. Despite the intimate link Aristotle has with young children, Mattel has said that it will not conduct research into how the device is affecting kids development. Another smart toy, the interactive Cayla doll was taken off the market in Germany because its Bluetooth connection made it vulnerable to hacking MIT said.

The WEF report concludes by warning stakeholders that AI products come with risks and benefits and that the risks are especially concerning in relation to their use by children.

Amanda Brown is a reporter with the Western Standardabrown@westernstandardonline.comTwitter: @WS_JournoAmanda

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WEF publishes toolkit on artificial intelligence and kids - Western Standard