House E&C Members Look to Fold AI Regulation Into Privacy Bill
The House Commerce Committee can tweak its privacy bill to address threats posed by AI technology, members said Wednesday during the first in a series of AI hearings.
All four members who introduced the American Data Privacy and Protection Act (ADPPA) in 2022 spoke of the need to pass comprehensive legislation this Congress. Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash.; ranking member Frank Pallone, D-N.J.; House Consumer Protection Subcommittee Chairman Gus Bilirakis, R-Fla.; and subcommittee ranking member Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., agreed there won’t be adequate protections against AI technology without passing a federal privacy law.
“We’re working on” ADPPA reintroduction, and “we’re trying to build some consensus,” Bilirakis told us during House votes Wednesday. The bill won’t “be in the same form” as last year but “close to it.” Asked if they’re renegotiating language, he said, “We’re working across party lines. ... We want to build consensus, and obviously we want the Senate on board. The sooner, the better, but we want to get a good product.” He noted testimony from Wednesday’s hearing that the ADPPA is stronger than any of the 13 state privacy laws that have passed.
Ex-FTC Chair Jon Leibowitz told the committee the ADPPA is even stronger than California’s privacy law. California, for example, didn’t include the same standards for data minimization or a prohibition on targeted advertising for children, he said.
AI “should be included” in the comprehensive bill, Schakowsky said during the hearing. The committee made such “great progress in a bipartisan way” in 2022, she said. “We can move ahead now in adding AI to that as well, and we ought to get on it right now.”
Passing a national privacy law is the first step for ensuring a “prosperous future” for AI technology, said Rodgers during the hearing. “The bedrock of any AI regulation must be privacy legislation,” said Pallone. The speed of AI deployment is “staggering,” and it’s affecting everything from employment and housing to education and consumer privacy, he said.
Existing law can be used to address AI issues, but Congress needs to strengthen agency authority through a federal privacy law, said AI Now Institute Executive Director Amba Kak. She noted the FTC is investigating OpenAI for potential algorithmic deception (see 2309120072) and other agencies are exploring their AI authorities.
NTIA Administrator Alan Davidson discussed AI issues during a Wall Street Journal Tech Live appearance Tuesday. He said the rise of machine learning is creating serious concerns for intellectual property protection. Expect courts to find the fastest answers, but government agencies are exploring how to best approach the technology, he said. Davidson said he has concerns about algorithmic bias, which can lead to discrimination and false arrests: “There’s so many of these examples. We’re not going to succeed in this space if we don’t have diverse voices” involved in policymaking.
AI technology threatens the livelihood of Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists members, testified actor Clark Gregg during Wednesday’s hearing. Gregg said AI is “harvesting” human labor through the unauthorized use of names and likenesses. The ramifications for writers, filmmakers and actors are “huge,” he said: AI technology should be working for humans, not the other way around.