A Consortium of Finnish organisations seeks for a shared way to proactively inform citizens on AI use

Six Finnish organisations have kicked off a project to standardise public organisations’ transparency and communications of the use of AI to citizens. The project provides an information model for public sector AI transparency and design guidelines for public sector AI informing.

Transparency of citizen data usage and algorithmic decision-making is a widely recognised global challenge. AI systems and algorithmic decision-making are increasingly used in public administration to service citizens in their various life-events, however, people do not have access to sufficient information about what, by whom and how these decisions are being made. Hence, by offering standardised information and communication guidelines on personal data usage, AI systems and algorithmic decision-making, the project wishes to maintain trust between citizens and cities & governments.

The overall objective of the project is to agree on a shared approach so that the same model can be taken into use widely across public sector organisations. Informing citizens in a standardised way will also improve the understandability of the information for the citizens.

Citizen Trust Through AI Transparency project is part of Sitra’s IHAN project for fair data economy. In the consortium project, Sitra provides support for cities’ development work. The project participants are City of Espoo, City of Helsinki, Kela (the Social Insurance Institution of Finland), Finland’s Ministry of Justice, The Finnish Innovation Fund Sitra and Saidot (AI transparency software development company). The project will be finished by the end of 2019 and the outcomes of the project will be licensed under Creative Commons.