SDF

I have the extraordinary privilege of working with passionate engineers, government, academia, business, civil society and other stakeholders around the world to understand tomorrow’s technologies – such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) – and the foundational needs society will have to define practices to make those technologies trusted, responsible and inclusive.

At Microsoft, we’ve identified six ethical principles – fairness, reliability and safety, privacy and security, inclusivity, transparency, and accountability – to guide the cross-disciplinary development and use of AI. The better we understand these issues — and the more technology developers and users can share best practices to address them — the better served the world will be as we contemplate societal rules to govern AI. It is this understanding and these best practices that will help build standards that support important societal decisions and thoughtful government policy to address not just “what can AI do” but “what should it do.”

I lead Microsoft’s work in international standards communities worldwide as Vice President of the Corporate Standards Group, a part of Microsoft’s Corporate, External and Legal (CELA) organization. We work across technical, policy and legal boundaries contributing to international standards development to advance technology that helps individuals and organizations achieve more. Serving Microsoft for 15 years, I’ve had the opportunity to play roles serving both engineering and our sales field as VP and General Manager in Microsoft’s CELA group.

While we are only starting to grasp the potential economic and social benefits and challenges of AI, policymakers, companies and civil society are working to understand where the technology will lead us. The technology is already improving the way people work and changing how key sectors of society are organized. But these rapid technology changes also raise complex questions about the impact they will have on other aspects of society: jobs, privacy, safety, inclusiveness and fairness. To realize the full benefits of AI, we’ll need to work together to find answers to these questions and create systems that people trust. So much of what makes technology work in the modern world is the creation of international standards, industry codes and government certifications. At Microsoft we remain committed to working across our industry, in standards development organizations, with our partners and governments, to find the right balance between laws, regulation and standards.