The provincial government is looking at both internal rules, and potential legislation governing the use of artificial intelligence.
Digital Government and Service NL Minister Sarah Stoodley says government does make use of AI in terms of “sophisticated rules-based engines” that look at things like government data, but they are not making use of generative AI systems—such as Chat GPT.
Stoodley says internal policies are in development, and developing legislation is on their radar.
She says they are looking at what other jurisdictions are doing, such as the federal government.
Stoodley explains they have bill C-27 making its way through parliament, which would provide rules for AI in federally-regulated industries. However, Stoodley says the proposed legislation is “weak,” and she has been trying for about half a year to get a meeting with the federal minister to talk about it, but has been unsuccessful .
That said, she believes provincial legislation could look similar.
She hopes their rules would be much stronger than Ottawa’s, and would govern provincially regulated industries—such as credit unions.
Stoodley favours the European Union’s approach, which employs the use of various risk categories
For example, companies in a low risk category can use AI however they want, but the higher the risk the more rules there are.