Estonia, EU – Baltic States, Legislation, Technology
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Thursday, 28.03.2024, 13:34
EU justmins discuss legal issues re artificial intelligence, robotics
EU justice
minister at a meeting in Bulgaria on Friday discussed the future of the
European Prosecutor's Office, the regulation of cross-border civil proceedings
and legal issues of artificial intelligence and robotics, the Ministry of
Justice said.
Reinsalu said that questions concerning robotics and
artificial intelligence will also pose challenges in the justice field in the
near future.
"Artificial intelligence and robotics are key
technologies, which enliven the economy and enable to improve people's access
to public services and administration of justice. It was found already at the
EU Digital Summit held in Tallinn last year that the digital remodelling
of the branches of industry must be accelerated to create a more consumer
friendly environment and for that we must have an effective legislative
framework," he said.
"It is clear that when it comes to introducing
these technologies, we must think through joint security standards,
responsibility and legal and ethical issues. One of the tasks of the next
presidency countries will be to find a suitable balance between developing new
technologies and ensuring fundamental rights and freedoms, including the right
to privacy and data protection rules," Reinsalu said.
Reinsalu introduced to his European colleagues the activity
of the expert group for self-driving vehicles established next to the
Government Office in fall 2016, one of the tasks of which is to analyze the
need for changing the legal system. "This experience clearly indicated
that a more general cross-sectoral approach to legal issues of artificial
intelligence is needed to increase legal clarity and avoid the creation of
controversial regulations. For that, an expert group across agencies will be
established in the near future, who will start to develop a cross-sectoral
regulation and artificial intelligence strategy," he said.
The justice ministers also talked about the future of
the European Prosecutor's Office and discussed its cooperation with
already existing EU agencies. According to Estonia, the key issue is effective
reciprocal information exchange between the European Prosecutor's Office and
other agencies in order to ensure the existence of necessary information.
The ministers also discussed the recognition of
cross-border jurisdiction and decisions and the fulfillment of them in family
matters, including marital matters, parental responsibility and civil law
"child abductions". The main aim of the amendments is faster
procedure both in recognizing and fulfilling the decisions of the courts of
other member states and the more effective cooperation of the central institutions
of the member states. Reinsalu introduced to his European colleagues the
Estonian court system's new information system KIS, for which a speech
recognition system for the automatic transcription of the audio recordings of
court sittings is being developed.