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EU: Insurance Europe publishes insight briefing on European insurance industry's views on AI

Insurance Europe announced, on 3 August 2020, that it had published an insight briefing ('the Insight Briefing') about the European insurance industry's views on artificial intelligence ('AI'). Furthermore, Insurance Europe outlined three challenges in maximising the benefit for both consumers and themselves in their use of AI. Firstly, Insurance Europe noted that when developing AI systems, insurers face restricted access to data from the public sector, and stated that, for maximum societal benefit, such datasets should be available for free and in a machine-readable format. In addition, Insurance Europe highlighted that the non-personal data for some AI applications is also sometimes concentrated in the hands of a few entities, resulting in restricted or expensive access to data that could improve AI systems and better serve customers. 

Insurance Europe further noted in the Insight Briefing that insurers would like to see a holistic approach to regulation. Moreover, Insurance Europe stated that the EU legal framework already covers areas relevant to AI such as fundamental rights, privacy, and data protection, as well as product safety and liability, which is then complemented by national regulatory frameworks. To support the development and uptake of AI, and to avoid unnecessary regulatory burdens, Insurance Europe noted that a horizontal, proportionate, and principles-based AI regulatory framework is needed that builds on existing EU and national regulatory frameworks. Insurance Europe also opined that there is currently a lack of effective collaboration between authorities with responsibilities in the field of digitalisation and that there is a need for all national authorities, whether they are responsible for the conduct of business, prudential regulation, competition, or data protection, to work closely together and ensure consistency in applying the rules to further develop the digital single market.

Furthermore, Insurance Europe stipulated that new EU rules for AI are only required if there are gaps in existing legislation, and for this reason, European (re)insurers do not support the creation of a civil liability regime for the use of AI because developing any kind of strict liability and compulsory insurance scheme for AI would not work. In addition, as Insurance Europe noted in the Insight Briefing, the conditions for mandatory insurance, which include sufficient similarity in the risks being covered and sufficient data on the risks, are not met. Moreover, Insurance Europe called for existing legislation to be reviewed to see if it creates barriers to AI, for example, further guidance on the application of the General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (EU) 2016/679) ('GDPR'). Finally, Insurance Europe called for the deployment of ethical, trustworthy, and human-centric AI via an appropriate, risk-based, and proportionate regulatory framework. The scope of the framework should be targeted only at those AI applications with proven high risk and significant effects on the rights of individuals, as not all uses of AI pose significant risks or directly impact consumers. In the context of financial services legislation, and insurance, in particular, principles such as transparency, fairness, accountability, and ethics are to some extent already addressed by rules on the conduct of business and disclosure, while rules on advice apply whether the recommendation is provided by a human or by AI.

You can read the press release here and the Insight Briefing here.

 

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