Australia’s privacy regulator has fired a warning shot at businesses that are ignoring the privacy risks that come with using artificial intelligence, as it releases its advice on how to use the technology safely.
On Monday, the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) released guides on how Australia’s privacy laws apply to businesses using commercially available AI products, such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, and businesses training their own AI models.
These guides came with a warning from privacy commissioner Carly Kind, who said businesses using AI was one of the top points of interest and a challenge for industry.
“Our new guides should remove any doubt about how Australia’s existing privacy law applies to AI, make compliance easier, and help businesses follow privacy best practice. AI products should not be used simply because they are available,” she said in a media release.
The OAIC’s guides recommend businesses using AI consider privacy risks as a way of building and maintaining trust — a standard Kind says both the public and her office expect companies to meet.
“The community and the OAIC expect organisations seeking to use AI to take a cautious approach, assess risks and make sure privacy is a key consideration. The OAIC reserves the right to take action where it is not,” she said.
Businesses using AI have already come under the OAIC’s microscope, with the regulator investigating the use of facial recognition technology by Clearview AI, Kmart and Bunnings.
The OAIC has also asked Australia’s largest medical imaging provider I-MED to explain its partnership with health technology company harrison.ai after a Crikey investigation revealed I-MED had provided harrison.ai with medical records to train AI without patients’ knowledge.
With the government’s first tranche of Privacy Act reforms yet to pass Parliament, Kind also reiterated her push for changes to the law — including a positive obligation on businesses to be fair and reasonable when handling personal information — as necessary for protecting Australians’ privacy when using AI.
“With developments in technology continuing to evolve and challenge our right to control our personal information, the time for privacy reform is now,” she said.
