User:FedericoFerri/Codice Civile sulla Robotica nell Unione Europea

An example of Worker Robot

The European Union (EU) Civil rights laws on robotics were established on February 16th,2017 during the Strasbourg commission by the European Parliament, aiming to update and complete the UE´s current normative, through ethical guidelines that reflect the complexity of current-day robotics and their social, medical and bioethical implications, a precise and efficient ethical framework is needed to help guide the design, production, and use of robots and Artifical intelligence.

Historical Framework

A new era of robotics and artificial intelligence is upon us, seemingly ready to unleash a new industrial revolution, because of this is of the utmost importance that the legislators begin to ponder the ethical and legal consequences of these technologies.

In the last 200 years, the employment rate has exponentially increased thanks to technological development; the growth on the robotics and AI field could potentially change our way of life, our way of working, as well as improve the efficiency and quality of services provided.

Between 2010 and 2015, robot sales increased by an average of 17% each year, which in 2015 sales registered the largest annual increase observed so far (33%), and which have tripled over the last 10 years Annual patent applications in the robotics technology sector.

Ethics

The European parliament agreed that while there was a huge potential in the use of robotics there will also be a great threat to the safety of humans, having agreed on the threat that robots could present a possible update of the current legal framework of the European Union has been proposed, in order to align its ethical principles with the complexity of modern robotics.

In particular, a code of conduct was proposed for robot designers and research committees on robotics issues, this code must express all values ​​and rights established in article 2 of the treaty of the European union and in the charter of fundamental rights.

Robots must follow the principle of transparency, that is, it must be possible to understand the reasons behind any decision made with the help of AI (Artificial Intelligence) that can influence the life of one or more people, it should be possible to reduce computations of the system so that it is readable by a human. These robots must be equipped with a system that allows them to save all the transactions they carry out.

The European parliament suggests that special attention shall be paid to the robots who may attack the confidentiality of some individual, due to them being found traditionally in protected places and outside the reach of people alien to its development.

Principles

According to the European parliament a robot is considered “autonomous” if it learns through experience and/or interactions, adapts itself to their current environment and exchanges data with it. The parliament determined that robots and AI are to be design to only complement human beings, in order to achieve this it is essential that humans have full control over the decisions made by robots and AI.

Civil Laws

1. Protect human beings from damage caused by robots.
2. Respect the denial of attention by a robot.
3. Protect the human liberty against the robots.
4. Protect humanity against privacy violations committed by a robot.
5. Management of personal data processed by robots.
6. Protect humanity against manipulation risk by robots.
7. Avoid losing social ties.
8. Equality of access to the progress in robotics.
9. Restrict human access to the improvement technologies
   

Devices affected

Means of transport

Autonomous vehicle

It covers all forms of road, rail, inland waterway, remotely piloted and autonomous transport, including vehicles, trains, ships, ferries, aircraft, and drones, as well as all-new ways of transport that are developed in the future

Drones

Commonly known as an unmanned aero vehicle (UAV), a UAV as its name suggests is a non-tripulated aircraft, capable of controlled autonomous flight, commonly powered by an explosion, electric or reaction engine.

Care robots

Care robots are robots whose main purpose is to exercise prevention, assistance, monitoring, and company functions for the elderly or those with dementia, cognitive disorders, and memory loss.

Guidelines

The European Parliament deemed necessary the introduction of a trustworthy system design principles covering all aspects of a robot´s operation, for both hardware and software design, and for any data processing on or off the platform for security purposes. This system was proposed in the Annex attached to the Strasbourg Commision´s resolution.

EU's Document

Current development of intelligent and autonomous machines is aiming to imbue them with the ability to think and make decisions independently, which implies not only economic advantages, but also a possible threat on current society. Considering that machine learning offers enormous economic and innovative advantages to society, by greatly improving the ability to analyze data, without ensuring non-discrimination, transparency and intelligibility of decision-making processes.

It’s necessary to consider which jobs will be most affected by this development.

Automation must be an opportunity to allow people to free themselves from the most monotonous tasks and allow them to devote themselves to other more creative tasks. According to the latest research, the fastest growing jobs are those in which a individual needs to either develop or use a machine for a specific task.

Due to the increase in social fissures and the decrease of the middle class, it is necessary to take into account that the rise of robotics can be understood in a high condensation of wealth and control of power in favor of a minority.

Leveraging that the development of artificial intelligence and robotics will influence employment, which can generate new concerns regarding responsibility, and in turn eliminate others; Noting that Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council constitutes a legal framework for the protection of personal data. It may be necessary to address other aspects related to the access to data and the protection of personal data. The evolution of robotics has to protect the preservation of the dignity of the individual, it is necessary to consider that it is possible that in the near future artificial intelligence can overcome human intelligence.

Noting that in several foreign countries, such as the USA, Japan, China and South Korea, they are intended to favor regulatory measures in the fields of robotics and artificial intelligence, and that in some cases they are already being carried out; that some Member States have begun to meditate on the possible creation of legal norms or the introduction of legislative changes in order to consider the new applications of these technologies.

It should be borne in mind that European industries could benefit from an adequate regulatory framework, efficient, transparent and coherent approach that determines conditions clear enough for companies to carry out application development and plan their business models at scale, while ensuring that the EU states maintain control over the regulations to be established, so that they are not forced to adopt or accept standards established by third countries that are also at the forefront of robotics and intelligence development artificial; Whereas it should be understood that the laws of Asimov are aimed at designers, manufacturers and operators of robots, including those that have integrated autonomy and self-learning capacity, since these laws cannot be translated into machine code. It is necessary to have a series of rules regarding responsibility, transparency and accountability that reflect the intrinsically European and universal humanist values ​​that characterize Europe's contribution to society; that these norms should not affect the research, innovation and development process in the field of robotics;

Reliability

In order to ensure efficiency, coherence and transparency in the legal certainty of the entire European Union, the civil liability of the damages carried out by robots must be analyzed. Robot-human relationships must be based on basic interdependence relationships, fundamental to define what information can be shared between human beings and robots, forming a common basis between them. The future legislative instrument should consist of an in-depth evaluation that defines whether an objective responsibility approach should be used. Risk management does not consist of the person who acted negligently, but rather the person qualified to minimize risks and manage a negative impact.

EU's parliament stated: “The future legislative instrument should be based on an in-depth evaluation carried out by the Commission that defines whether the objective responsibility or risk management approach should be applied. It would be convenient to establish a mandatory insurance scheme, which could be based on the producer's obligation of signing insurance for autonomous robots manufactured by him. The insurance system should be complemented with a fund to ensure compensation for damages in cases where there is no insurance coverage.

Any political decision on the rules of civil responsibility applicable to robots and artificial intelligence should be taken after consulting a research and development project at European level specializing in robotics and neuroscience, so that scientists and experts are able to assess all risks and the associated consequences; "

Autonomous means of transport

Autonomous Vehicles

The automotive sector is the one that needs an urgent reform or update in the rules of the EU and the world, that guarantees the development of these automated and autonomous vehicles in order to realize an operation in the financial sector and thus benefit from the positive effects of this technological development. The obstacle of the implementation of these new automatic systems in urban transport systems must be taken into account, which could generate European competitiveness.

It is necessary to take into account that if the automatic system is the one that controls the vehicle, it also has the availability of a driver's takeover. If this is necessary as the driver's reaction time is of very big importance, and therefore, interested parties are asked to provide realistic values ​​that determine the safety and responsibility aspects.

The transition of automated vehicles will have an impact on the following aspects: civil liability and road safety, all issues related to the environment, data issues, issues related to new technologies, infrastructure and employment (training of heavy vehicle drivers for the use of automated vehicles); underlines that considerable investments in road, energy and new technologies infrastructure will be needed; the Commission is requested to examine the aspects mentioned in its work on autonomous vehicles.

Underlines the decisive importance that the reliability of the position and time information provided by the European satellite navigation programs Galileo and EGNOS has for the implementation of autonomous vehicles; and urges that the satellites necessary to complete the European Galileo positioning system get ready and launched as soon as possible;

These new automated transports also carry great relevance for people with low mobility, since their participation in individual road transport is improved, which makes their daily lives easier.

Drones

In the European Parliament, the progress made by drones was recognized, particularly in the field of search and rescue, the importance of using drones to preserve the security and privacy of EU citizens was also stressed. Likewise, the Commission is requested to monitor the recommendations made in the European Parliament Resolution of October 29th, 2015; on the safe use of remotely piloted aircraft systems (RPAS), commonly known as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), in the field of civil aviation; the Commission is urged to carry out evaluations of the security problems related to the use of drones, asks the Commission to study the need to introduce a mandatory system for monitoring and identification of RPAS that allows to know in real time their flight position; recalls that the homogeneity and safety of unmanned aircraft must be guaranteed by the measures set out in Regulation (EC) No 216/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council.