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Democracy in the Time of AI: The Duty of the Media to Illuminate, Not Obscure
Sara Ibrahim, Online Editor & Journalist for the public service SWI swissinfo.ch, the international unit of the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation
Wednesday, Feb. 21, 2024 · 9:15 a.m. · 13m 08s
The media is considered a pillar democratic institution, but can artificial intelligence obscure or illuminate it? We explore how journalistic accountability can navigate algorithms, risks of manipulation and the crucial role of transparency in safeguarding democracy.
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hello everyone it's an order for me to open the symposium my name is sarah
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a brain and i'm a journalist for those with publicly gets within for that c. h.
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today i'm gonna focus mainly on media and how a
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i is this rocking uh i would work a journalism
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um but i think it's very important that we are here together because
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democracy is something that concerns all the thoughts that concerns the whole world
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and just here will have four billion people heading
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to the polls up on the word for elections
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so it's really really important that we talk about a a i and technology and democracy
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just a few words about me um i've been uh
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working at the sciences that journalists for almost ten years now
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i'm writing a both for special lights them for a general uh audience
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this is two thousand and twenty have been working go that's we seem full three
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c. for some of you may know it's the international service of this was broadcasting corporation
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and it's reporting in the past and uh independent articles and ten languages mainly
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for an international audience interested in switzerland
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before we start talking about media yeah i i
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want to lay the foundation of these uh symposium
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i'm asking one important question that is how is how would the more christy doing
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uh we don't have to take it for granted because
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actually democracy is in decline around the world as a
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this graph uh from view them that is uh an
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independent project from the university of gotten bored in sweden
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um discuss show was a very well that electoral democracies are the climb
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so we had an all time high in two
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thousand and sixteen with ninety six uh democracies electoral democracies
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and this number has fallen to uh um ninety democracies
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electoral democracies in two thousand and twenty two so we had um these decrees
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on the other hand we had one of the warming trend so more and more countries are out to criticising
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uh in more and more people only been them we had again i record number of uh
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um countries in the process of becoming a talk with season two thousand and twenty two
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we'd for t. count trees and also the number
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of people has become more than that whole oh wait
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three point two billion people in two thousand and twenty two leaving in uh upper
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thighs encounters compared to one point five b. you need to top the years two thousand
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i'm the same time and probably it's not a coincidence
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t. i. has exploded does uh all all of you know was we know as we experienced
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and it has a completely transform our lives our society
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and and every sector that we know comprising goals so of journalism in politics
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which are so important for our democracy um so the question is why should we care about yeah i
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entering the media space why this is concerned that all of us should
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have and not just uh the media uh they also is very simple
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because uh to have a healthy and strong democracy we have
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to have healthy and strong journalism had the and strong media
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this is uh the condition also to have 'em informed
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well informed in critical citizens able to make a um
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informing critical decisions that for our democracies we need these um you ready stick
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and diverse a medium length in landscape that is strong enough to support that
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the media is so important this is even considered the
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forced a power all our democracies of over happy democracy
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um as you know in our democratic system we had three main
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uh how worse than to just let you the executive indigent usually
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well the media is considered to be the four fourth one and why
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is that because it is the check and balance of our public institutions
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uh overworked societies of our private companies of our politicians and public features
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and it holds a accountable uh the carter tree up hours per day action so it's
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really really key but uh um lackeys in
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some ways and unfortunately as well a i
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is disrupting get these um six than the media system
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and and also the rodent um democracy i highlighted three
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main ways in which a a i is doing that
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first is such a rating been news market with content
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and when you're lacking this content is just cheap and meaningless uh information
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when we are not lackey we have misinformation disinformation
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an event you know ten take tax videos and images
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um the second way is um actually owned or
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yeah is is um collecting data about all of us
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and exposing us to um
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selected information with um the risk
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of creating future bottles uh of bomb us news
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it's always are all targeted manipulation and even of undermining
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tim horton's of i'll be ready stick and that verse society that we need um just
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sustained democracy uh i'm not dear aspect that sometimes
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it's overlooked is that um the eyes actually weakening
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um the business model of journalism
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because private uh media companies are losing
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the revenues to big tech companies in the air force unfortunately to
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um leave a behind the a
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journalist into five year journalism a journalist
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um it's me guess applies for some of you but this is a happening go
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read you also in this democratic happy highland that is with a lot that is admired
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all over the world um for it's a unique uh direct uh a democracy
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um as um this investigation from
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a arboretum watching i forensic show
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um microsoft being a chart bought um that was
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spreading misinformation in even scandals a fake scandals invented completely
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uh about politicians had had up the swiss national elections in
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october two thousand and twenty three so the situation is serious
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um then of course the b. tech companies are
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continue to try to convince us that they will
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uh do wherever daycare and two car but um the misinformation created by the you
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own a i platforms but if we're not acting guys media and possible but meant
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how can we expect them to do so and can we really trust them
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um yeah it's sad but um the media still not just to keep
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to fight back a big tech um we can see here it has pervaded
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every aspect of of journalism and uh as this
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graphs from uh the international news media association show was
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uh we had the other big race uh with the launch of a touchy picky in november and twenty two
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um it reached handed me an users in just a two months
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it's incredible and at the same time we had more than seventy percent
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oh i'm media organisations using high for different operations they knew from
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um use a guide or even go to a news production to news distribution and some of
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them are even saying that uh d. r.
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uh ready to replace human journalist with a i
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this is how i'm a i is the
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to the whole nine using uh the news market
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and overshadowing also the the work of the quality a journalism
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um i'm not doing graphic formed international news make association shows that
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a i generated a website it's a increased to eat thirteen times
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in just seven months in two thousand and twenty three and i'm at the same time
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we had these um incredible they ate out
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of doubly i generated websites that exceeds really massively
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what i'm quite decide slight claremont like
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new york times can uh can provide a
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um in terms of a number of articles they do so we have for instance
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hundreds of articles lady by the mount and the top guide
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uh news generated a sites news guard thousand and two hundred so
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it's really a big difference um some big news
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media organisation of trying to fight back this trend
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the new york times um so you open e. r. a. and a microsoft word to use
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of a deer journalistic uh uh content under copyright and the b. b. c. decided to blog
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open and yeah i i'm from accessing the web sites but the reality is said
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because the majority all the small to medium size the organisation can
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not just compete with the i didn't have the resources to fight back
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we as we see if we are small because we are a hundred of people um
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more or less but we had the luxury to be part of a
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of public media system and we are not on the pressure with um
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the advertising and revenues um so we have the opportunity to focus on quality and
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on being transparent in how we use a i and how we're doing that uh first
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checking a big lose the other sources and each
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articles reviewing it many times sometimes by different people
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and secondly we are on the edge also to publish a our
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guidelines uh in which we will uh declare how we use and don't
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use a i uh it for our work so for instance
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we use the ifor translations uh for um reading articles some
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um and also for news money chewing but we don't use
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a i as a sole source uh all research and for creating
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journalistic content we also state i'm clearly when content but this
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polish uh on our website is a creative with uh the how
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we all the i in this is a really good uh important uh
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but what's a key is that a journalist or human is behind every
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word and every article that was published on our web sites and this
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is not just important for us is is important also for our readers
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uh again as the um these uh survey interesting survey
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from the fault from the university of the body and
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the show was um readers this with cinema are really
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critical uh about uh the low quality of the i
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generated content they are i'm willing to pay for them
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and they ask for more transparency in declaring when content
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was created with help partially or totally uh of uh yeah i so
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more than a overhead or eighty percent of the people uh replying to the this are we
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and ask for that so it's a really big a number there is still a a
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lot to do because um we lack in
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journalism um code of ethics that is widely um
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accessible and a wildly i'm a widely agreed on the use of the iron
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algorithms eh in the media and we as journalists we have to demand that
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but also you will see the society as academics um as experts um and
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governments uh as well for sure and this is the only way in which
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i wanted to join castle by in can differentiate itself from um that um
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oh sure and and the vast amount of uh yeah i generated content bodies out there
Conference Program
Opening and introduction
Prof. Lonneke van der Plas, Group Leader at Idiap, Computation, Cognition & Language
Feb. 21, 2024 · 9 a.m.
101 views
