MONTRÉAL, Feb. 14, 2024 -- Mila - Quebec Artificial Intelligence Institute is proud to host an international conference on human rights and artificial intelligence (AI), which will take place on its premises in Montréal from February 14 to 16, 2024. The conference "Protecting Human Rights in the Age of AI" aims to highlight and advance the critical efforts needed to incorporate human rights into AI governance mechanisms.

As part of this event, Mila is gathering high-ranking officials from the United Nations, the OECD, UNESCO, IEEE, NIST, Amnesty International, the Council of Europe, and many others to partake in discussions on topics ranging from human rights impact assessments, tools and metrics to evaluate risk, and the availability of redress mechanisms. This conference is one of the first official events at which these major international organizations come together to specifically address the intersection of AI governance and human rights.

Global AI governance efforts have considerably accelerated over the past year, and most national governments and multilateral organizations have now identified AI governance as a priority. However, a large part of the discussions about AI governance and human rights have evolved separately. This has left the intersection of these two areas underexplored and not sufficiently understood.

In addition to panel discussions with leaders from the academic, civil society and policymaker communities, working group sessions will convene key stakeholders to deliberate on critical issues related to Human Rights Impact Assessments, setting the stage for the formulation of concrete recommendations that will help shape the future of international AI governance.

The full program and the list of confirmed speakers are available here.

Quotes

"Mila is proud to bring together renowned experts from international organizations, civil society, industry and academia to discuss issues related to human rights and AI. This technology is having a profound impact on our societies, and there is an urgent need to collectively address these issues in order to offer concrete recommendations for inclusive and responsible international AI governance." – Benjamin Prud'homme, Vice-President, Policy, Society and Global Affairs, Mila

"This conversation on AI and human rights organized by Mila is very timely, as we have a unique opportunity this year at the United Nations Summit of the Future to shape our digital future. We must ensure that AI's power is harnessed for global good and its risks addressed through governance grounded in international norms, including universal human rights." – Amandeep Singh Gill, Under-Secretary-General and Tech Envoy, United Nations

"Mila's dialogue is particularly timely given all the decisive policy initiatives coming to fruition in 2024. Human rights, well-being and inclusivity are critical challenges to our collective future with AI. Policymakers and all actors in the AI value chain must work together to provide the building blocks for agile and effective solutions to ensure trustworthy and beneficial AI. We must maintain and deepen the mutual learning, dialogue and trust between technologists and all stakeholder groups." – Karine Perset, Head of OECD.AI Policy Observatory and Network of Experts

About Mila

Founded by Professor Yoshua Bengio of the University of Montreal, Mila is a research institute in artificial intelligence that now brings together over 1,200 specialized researchers in machine learning. Based in Montreal, Mila's mission is to be a global center for scientific advancements that inspire innovation and the growth of AI for the benefit of all. Mila is a globally recognized non-profit organization for its significant contributions to deep learning, especially in the fields of language modeling, automatic translation, object recognition, and generative models. For more information, visit mila.quebec

Media Contact: Eric Aach, eaach@national.ca, (514) 569-3594