Technology Issues - Newspaper

A significant global debate is underway about the disruptive impact of new technologies. Modern technology contributes to, and is responsible for, the myriad positive developments that empower people, improve lives, increase productivity, advance medical and scientific knowledge, and transform society. There is no doubt that there is. Technological development has helped drive unprecedented social and economic progress. However, the Fourth Industrial Revolution also includes advanced technological evolution, creating disruptions, new vulnerabilities and harmful effects that are not fully understood, much less managed. Is not … The digital world faces cybersecurity challenges as threats increase worldwide. Data theft and fraud, cyberattacks, breaches of critical systems, power grids and financial markets are all part of the growing risk.

Communication technology now dominates our lives like never before. It brings immense benefits, but it also brings new dangers. For example, the phenomenon of fake news is not new. But its ubiquity today has a lot to do with digital technology, which has spawned the proliferation of information channels and the expansion of social media. Online platforms have become vehicles for spreading misinformation. Fake news spreads easily due to the ubiquitous power of social media in a largely unregulated environment. It gives you a guarantee that you will not be questioned. As such, fake news is posted on social media without fear of retaliation. “Deepfakes” — videos altered using artificial intelligence (AI) — are now commonly used to mislead and deceive.

The profit motives and business models of social media companies prevent them from putting a real check on divisive and sensational content, whether it is true or false. In other words, the “digital wildfire” is rarely contained. Digital technology is also being exploited to commit crimes, recruit terrorists, and spread hatred, all of which endanger society. This presents challenges to social stability in what is now called the post-truth era.

Digital technology is also fueling domestic polarization and division. Studies point to devastating effects on political systems and democracies. In his March 2022 European Journal of Futures Research article, the author wrote: The connection between the rise of a right-wing populist leader and the deployment of his media, which is cynical but effective, is now well established as a leader of dubious democratic reputation rises to power.

New technologies bring opportunities and dangers to countries and people.

Artificial or machine intelligence poses many dangers, including invasion of privacy and multiple aspects of security. The biggest threat posed by autonomous weapons systems is the potential to take decision-making and even strategy out of human hands. They can independently target and neutralize their adversaries and operate without the benefit of human judgment or thoughtful calculation of risk. fueling an arms race for autonomous weapons.

The Age of AI: And our Human Future, co-authored by Henry Kissinger, Eric Schmidt, and Daniel Huttenlocher, reveals the dangers ahead. AI has ushered in a new era of human consciousness, says the author (Schmidt is his former Google CEO), and it will “revolutionize HR.” But this, they argue, can lead to humans losing their ability to reason, ponder, and conceptualize.

Their discussion of military uses of AI and how AI is being used to fight wars is particularly informative. AI enhances conventional, nuclear, and cyberweapon capabilities in ways that make security relationships between rival powers more problematic and conflicts more difficult to limit. The authors state that the goal of the nuclear age national security strategy was deterrence. This relied on a set of key assumptions, such as the enemy’s known capabilities, perceived doctrine, and predictable reactions. Their central argument about the precarious nature of AI weapons and cyber capabilities is that their value and effectiveness depend on their “opacity and deniability and, in some cases, the ambiguity of disinformation, intelligence gathering and sabotage.” Operating at the borderline…creating strategies without accepted doctrine”. They believe this will lead to dire consequences. They focus on the race for AI supremacy between China and the United States, which other countries are likely to join. AI capabilities are challenging traditional notions of security, and this intelligent book highlights how injecting “non-human logic into military systems” can lead to disaster.

A new generation of advanced military technology is a growing concern as it will have far-reaching implications for international peace and stability. The remote controlled warfare that the US-led Western forces have waged in Afghanistan for more than two decades has included the use of unmanned aerial vehicles or drones. This had serious consequences, resulting in the murder of innocent people. The use of a cyberweapon (the Stuxnet computer worm) by the United States to target Iranian facilities in her 2007 to undermine its nuclear program was the first of its kind. Recently, Russian and Ukrainian militaries have used remotely operated airborne platforms in the Ukrainian conflict. Dependence on technology can bring unforeseen problems to countries at war. For example, frontline Ukrainian soldiers are facing an outage of internet satellite services that would have prevented the Russian military from using its technology. reportedly caused losses.

Despite the risks and dangers of such new technologies, there is no international effort aimed at controlling them, let alone regulating their use. No major power move on any dialogue on cyber and AI arms control. If the global internet fails to be regulated, and giant and inexplicable social media companies continue to make excessive profits, the prospects for mitigating the destabilizing effects of cyber- and AI-enabled military forces are even greater. less.

The author is a former Ambassador to the United States, Great Britain and the United Nations.

Published at dawn on October 17, 2022