Australian tech companies tackle slow-moving regulations

This comes as Australia seeks to regulate the growth of artificial intelligence technologies and will consider bans in areas deemed high-risk.

Industry Minister Ed Husic said he wanted public discussion on the issue "to put a spotlight on those risks".

"So we can get to the point where there is a great degree of confidence and trust in the way that technology is used, to deliver a benefit for the community," he said.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman told the US Senate on May 17 the company wants to work with the government to prevent emerging technology from causing "significant harm to the world".

OpenAI's artificial intelligence research laboratory released a free chatbot, ChatGPT, in November 2022 that can generate anything from a jokey best-man's speech to a 10,000 word essay on Jean Paul Sartre.

"We try to be very clear-eyed about what the downside case is and the work that we have to do to mitigate that," Mr Altman said.

Australia's Centre for AI and Digital Ethics co-director Professor Jeannie Paterson said "technology is a fast moving field and the law can't hold all the answers".

She said when new technologies are launched we should be asking ethical questions including "who's better off, who's affected and what are the privacy concerns?"

These are useful considerations to ensure any breakthroughs were "truly beneficial" to society, she said.

Professor Paterson said "the harms, and indeed the opportunities, from burgeoning technology are not limited to AI - they're about digital transformation".

Researchers at the University of Melbourne have developed a crucial piece of technology to open the door for augmented reality (AR) to be used in a wider range of equipment.

Associate Professor Ranjith Unnithan and his team created the world's first flexible AR display using 3D printing and low cost, optical-quality materials.

His team's breakthrough, with KDH Design Corporation and the Melbourne Centre for Nanofabrication, could lead to AR displays built into motorcycle helmets feeding live visuals to the driver about the road ahead.

It could also be used at heritage sites to let tourists glide through a projection of what once stood in the space through thin, lightweight glasses.

But giving the public access to technology powerful enough to livestream information into a headset display, such as Robert Downey Jr's fictional Iron man, raised ethical uses.

Associate professor Unnithan said "we need to have some specific regulations in Australia when the technology becomes more popular".

"But the cats out of the bag to some extent because a lot of the technologies that we're concerned about are already available," Professor Paterson said.

Pausing innovation for years while rigorous testing is performed slows down development.

"I'm not so sure I want someone dictating what technologies should be available to the world with the exception of weapons of mass destruction," she said.

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Professor Paterson said laws couldn't determine the internal culture of technology companies. "That's where discussions of ethics in the digital space are really valuable."

Australian laws are often drafted in "open-texted terms" to give them flexibility to respond to change, she said.

"But when it comes down to it, the law doesn't make companies ethical. That's not the role of law," she said.

But the law does lay down some basic social values and norms that are felt to be important, she said.

"If we're going to have these conversations as a society, and I think we should, it means we all need to have a baseline of tech-literacy," Professor Paterson said.

"We should have the skills to understand, for example, why ChatGPT isn't sentient," she said.

With Australian Associated Press