Mr. Ronan Lupton:

This is it. Robotics in milking and birthing are part of the AI equation. There are no two ways about that.

I want to pick up on an issue the Deputy raised which was that of disabilities. I will personalise this, if that is okay. My third child is fairly profoundly disabled. He has a condition called alpha thalassemia X, ATR-X, syndrome. He is unlikely to acquire speech, so I look forward to facilities that would be developed using AI technologies. They may be iPads or speech development technology. He may develop some form of brain function, which will get him to five or six years of age and he will require long-term care. From my point of view, I look to the future hopefully in that regard. Professor O'Hare mentioned gene editing technology. It is too late for my child because gene editing technology based on developments that AI would use to look at massive gene clusters and to correct gene deficiencies will be something that is handleable very shortly. Unfortunately, however, it will not help my kid.

Looking at the issues the Deputy raised relating to my area of practice, which is media, technology, disinformation, misinformation and so on, when one considers what goes out in the mainstream media - for example, in newspapers - there are procedures and processes within editorial newsrooms that have journalists filing copy, whether it be from the Houses of the Oireachtas or wherever it is around the country, in live feeds. They literally send them from their iPads or their personal computers, PCs. They go into a news review process and sometimes they are subject to privilege, if they are court proceedings. There may be accidents or issues happening live. Usually, they are sent to lawyers to review them and to make sure nobody is being defamed, there is no privacy breach, and there is no contempt of court or whatever it happens to be. Nowadays newsrooms are using artificial intelligence technology. There is an Irish company called CaliberAI which the committee may or may not have heard from. That is certainly an interesting development.

What technology in that sphere does not catch sometimes is the fake news and the disinformation part because the story can be written in such a way that it looks bona fide. Going back to the suntan issue that occurred in The Irish Timesa while back, one can see how that occurred. Again, would a human have caught it? The answer is probably "No" because the story looked like it came from a contributor and looked bona fide.

I refer to generative technologies, such as ChatGPT and so on. Some of the examples are anecdotal and some are not. People have used generative technology to make legal submissions that have gone badly wrong for them and so forth. One of the issues, which is interesting, and Professor O'Hare mentioned the Pope, Donald Trump and deep fakes, is that a number of Irish celebrities have before the courts regarding fakes that have been put online saying that they are selling Bitcoin, Rolexes or whatever it happens to be. This is criminal activity; there are no two ways about that. It remains criminal technology whether it has been generated by an AI technology programme or by criminal gangs based wherever. They can be based in Ireland or anywhere in the world. That is a matter for law enforcement to deal with. I know we are at a meeting of the Joint Committee on Enterprise, Trade and Employment but there is a law enforcement question there and a civil liability question.

Effectively, the defamation laws here are good insofar as one can sue on foot of damage to reputation in that regard. It is a massive issue; there are no two ways about that.

In the Bar of Ireland's submission relating to civil liability issues, which is very much on point regarding the Deputy's question, and dealing with media, privacy, and data protection, what it said was that there should not be any whiplash or neck break changes to the legal norms here. In some other European countries, they have strict liability, for example, when it comes to AI and, in fact, the manufacturers of the technology can be brought before the courts. Whereas in Ireland, if we can track who it is or was on the balance of probabilities, one can succeed in a claim. The Bar of Ireland stated not to go so far as to change the law overnight, which again conflicts with what was said about the speed and pace of the technology. However, what we are talking about in terms of speed and pace is keeping up with how the technology develops.

I want to follow up on Deputy O'Reilly's earlier question, and it will probably be something the three contributors can agree with. The issue of regulatory impact assessments is something we have become used to in Ireland over the past 15 to 20 years, possibly because of the prevalence of European law coming in and more regulation in spaces. Regulatory impact assessments, when it comes to AI technology being dropped into media and literally any line of society and work, are of critical import. I am not talking about just a facade, with someone saying, "We have done a regulatory impact assessment. Thanks very much." I am not talking about that. I am talking employees rights being set out as follows and saying what the algorithm does or does not do insofar as that can be disclosed, for example.

I will go back to the point on journalism and media.

Journalism will not become automatic overnight. It is just not because, ultimately, feet are needed on the ground in the Oireachtas or wherever it is. There may be a transcript of today's proceedings but it will miss my joke about artificial insemination on a farm because the transcript will state it is "AI". That is a prime example of how it can go wrong. I will stop because I have taken up enough time but I am happy to come back to that, if any other contributors have questions along those lines.