(Yicai) July 4 -- Artificial intelligence's autonomous development could be a danger to human society, without adequate laws and regulations to govern it, the dean of Schwarzman College in Tsinghua University said at the 2024 World Artificial Intelligence Conference and High-Level Meeting on Global AI Governance that kicked off in Shanghai today.

Problems brought by technological development, including data safety and algorithmic discrimination, have risks and these musn’t be ignored, said Xue Lan at the conference’s opening ceremony.

Technologies have innate issues, he said. There are risks brought by technological development, including data safety, algorithmic discrimination and the energy situation. The misuse or abuse of AI will also affect employment in the long run.

In the past few years, China has established a relatively complete system to drive AI's healthy growth while minimizing risks, Xue said. There are a series of laws and regulations to push for AI's proper development in terms of how they are applied in different sectors, he said.

There are also rules governing algorithms, computing power, and data that can deal with risks. Moreover, there are laws targeting relevant issues and rules that govern its application in specific scenarios. In this way, the country has set up a comprehensive governing system of multiple dimensions, levels, fields, and measures, he claimed.

In 2015, the world's 193 countries adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development at a United Nations summit, which comprised 17 sustainable development goals including 169 indicators, to bring peace and prosperity to the world by 2030, he said. AI will help to achieve 134 of these indicators but is likely to adversely affect 59 of them.

The WAIC held its opening ceremony in Shanghai today. The three-day event is organized by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Science and Technology, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Cyberspace Administration of China, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China Association for Science and Technology, and Shanghai Municipal People's Government.

Editors: Xu Wei, Kim Taylor