Urgently needed: AI governance in cyber warfare
Artificial intelligence is quickly becoming central to societal growth. AI has great power to improve daily life, from education to healthcare, from sustainability to defense. AI also brings to the forefront a number of risks that cut across the core values of our societies. For instance, when AI is biased and prejudiced, it doesn’t just discriminate against one person, it discriminates against thousands.
In the context of a battlefield, where AI conducts target identification, if that system is not secure it may potentially harm a lot of non-combatants, violating fundamental war principles. If we abandon the ethics of cyber war, we might as well stop defending liberal democracies, because we’re behaving like our opponents want us to behave. This starts with the underlining ethics and governance of these technologies and the respect and values we hold dear and must protect and preserve.
Traditionally, western countries did not invest in non-kinetic cyber warfare because at the time the West held the upper hand in terms of superior technologies that allowed it more room to maneuver in this domain. This is no longer the case. China and Russia have partnered, proving to hold formidable positions in cyberspace.
The war in Ukraine has certainly proven cyber to be a concrete element, not just a domain of war but a terrain where opponents confront each other daily. Currently, there is no international agreement on regulating cyber warfare. An accident or conflict escalation could create a dangerously fatal scenario that will be difficult to recuperate from. Let’s say an autonomous weapons system is deployed without the threshold of risk or predictability. That’s why we need rules in cyberspace, not to just curb the behavior of opponents, but to hold them accountable should the unimaginable happen.
Governance of cyber warfare may seem like an alien concept because for governance to exist, it requires conflicting parties to adhere to the same set of rules and principles in the context of warfare.
