Through algorithms and artificial intelligence (AI), objects and digital services now demonstrate new skills they did not have before, right up to replacing human activity through pre-programming or by making their own decisions. As part of the internet of things, AI applications are already widely used today, for example in language processing, image recognition and the tracking and processing of data.

This policy brief illustrates the potential negative and positive impacts of AI and reviews related policy strategies adopted by the UK, US, EU, as well as Canada and China. Based on an ethical approach that considers the role of AI from a democratic perspective and considering the public interest, the authors make policy recommendations that help to strengthen the positive impact of AI and to mitigate its negative consequences.

DR MERCEDES BUNZ is Senior Lecturer at CAMRI (Communications and Media Research Institute), University of Westminster and author (with Graham Meikle) of The Internet of Things (Polity, 2018). She has given evidence at the House of Lords’ Select Committee for Artificial Intelligence, October 2017. DR LAIMA JANCIUTE was Research Fellow of the Policy Observatory at the Communication and Media Research Institute (CAMRI), University of Westminster.