Articles/Publications

Articles on the societal impacts of technology. Reports on matters related to technology ethics. You can find all of these and more in this curated set of reading material, which is continuously updated as new items become available.

Enhancing the Fairness and Performance of Edge Cameras with Explainable AI

The rising use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in human detection on Edge camera systems has led to accurate but complex models, challenging to interpret and debug. The research described in this paper presents a diagnostic method using XAI for model debugging, with expert-driven problem identification and solution creation. The approach helps identify model biases, essential for achieving fair and trustworthy models.

Custom Developer GPT for Ethical AI Solutions

This paper provides motivation for the need of a new software artefact: a custom Generative Pre-trained Transformer (GPT) for developers to discuss and solve ethical issues through AI engineering. The use of such a tool can allow practitioners to engineer AI solutions which meet legal requirements and satisfy diverse ethical perspectives. The paper details the idea and demonstrates a use case.

Do Generative AI Tools Ensure Green Code? An Investigative Study

The sustainability or ’greenness’ of software is typically determined by the adoption of sustainable coding practices. Despite their potential advantages, there is a significant lack of studies on the sustainability aspects of AI-generated code. Specifically, how environmentally friendly is the AI-generated code based upon its adoption of sustainable coding practices? This paper presents the results of an early investigation into the sustainability aspects of AI-generated code across three popular generative AI tools — ChatGPT, BARD, and Copilot.

Ethical Design and Implementation of AI in the Field of Learning and Education: Symmetry Learning Technique

This paper seeks to look into the nuanced role that leveraging AI technologies play in a manner that augments primary education while, at the same time, ensuring in the process protection to children’s privacy rights.

Bridging Deep Tech Ethics, Community Literacy, and Computer Science Education

This paper presents an assignment that leads students through a process of self-reflection, ethical analysis, and collaborative inquiry in a master’s level computer science course that blends professional communication and computing ethics.

Generative AI Has a Visual Plagiarism Problem

The degree to which large language models (LLMs) might “memorize” some of their training inputs has long been a question. This guest post in IEEE Spectrum discusses how LLMs are in some instances capable of reproducing, or reproducing with minor changes, substantial chunks of text that appear in their training sets.

AI Missteps Could Unravel Global Peace and Security

In this guest post in IEEE Spectrum, the authors discuss how AI practitioners—whether researchers, engineers, product developers, or industry managers—can play critical roles in mitigating risks through the decisions they make throughout the life cycle of AI technologies.

Emerging AI Cybersecurity: Challenges and Solutions

Did you know that the information you enter into a chatbot could also be used to train AI in the future? This can result in language models that reveal sensitive or private information to third parties. IEEE Impact Creators weigh in on how to defend against data leakage on IEEE Transmitter.

U.S. Executive Order Covers AI Safety, Algorithmic Bias, and Privacy

A recent U.S. action builds on earlier moves by the White House that laid out nonbinding principles for AI regulation and voluntary commitments on managing AI risks from 15 leading AI companies. It also comes in the context of major regulatory efforts around the world, including the European Union, China, Canada, Brazil, and Japan.