The Mazhilis is presenting a draft law on artificial intelligence (AI) issues. During the discussion of the legislative norms, Mazhilis deputy Yelnur Beisembaev expressed concern about how AI could impact various sectors in Kazakhstan, as reported by Tengrinews.kz.
The deputy commented that in the future, artificial intelligence might lead to job losses for some Kazakhs.
"We all understand that artificial intelligence is a driver of progress, and our task is to regulate it properly. The Head of State himself has been a proponent of this idea in his speeches over the past two years. Many areas of our lives can be regulated through artificial intelligence. The first question is that we all understand the influence of AI on the labor market. According to the World Economic Forum and banks, AI will replace approximately 90 million jobs worldwide. This data has been studied for several years. This will certainly affect the labor market. How are we going to regulate this issue?" - asked Yelnur Beisembaev.
According to him, the government of Kazakhstan significantly underestimates the unemployment rate in the country.
"We all understand that the actual unemployment figure in Kazakhstan is around 12-13 percent. That’s about 1 million people. And if AI replaces certain sectors now, this situation could worsen. Therefore, these issues need to be addressed in this draft law," - said the Mazhilis member.
He cited Japan as an example, where real people still issue bank cards instead of specialized machines using AI.
"Of course, it would not be difficult for Japan to shift to using AI, as we do, where you can get a card in a couple of minutes. But they all understand that replacing these people and finding new jobs for them is very challenging. That’s the first factor. The second factor is how quickly we can retrain these individuals and find them new employment?" - said Beisembaev.
He also expressed concerns about the risks of using AI in disease diagnosis.
"We understand that AI is currently being impressively utilized in medicine in European countries. There is information that even cancer diseases have been studied through AI, and about 95 percent of the diagnoses were accurate. But who will take responsibility then? Tomorrow a doctor might say that there’s a situation, and AI offers a treatment, but the person dies. Then the person who treated them might say: we studied this through AI?" - asked Deputy Beisembaev.
He also suggested considering potential risks when applying AI in the transportation sector and inquired how copyright issues would be regulated when creating music and other content using artificial intelligence.
"Another point is fraudulent issues. We understand that if fraudsters start using AI now, they will use it effectively. Right now, my speech could have any new thesis added to it, in my own voice, and be used as a statement. This issue also needs to be resolved legislatively, and clear boundaries need to be defined," - said the parliamentarian.
Deputy Ekaterina Smyshlyaeva, who presented the draft law on AI, promised to consider all her colleague's suggestions.
"Indeed, these are practical, sectoral issues that are not myths or the future; they are our present. Therefore, the most fundamental question here is the question of responsibility. It is already outlined in the draft law. However, I believe that taking into account sectoral issues, we will detail it further, as it is quite broad at this point. And the second, perhaps the most global question is the issue of copyright. Regulation has also begun in the draft law, but it is still somewhat referential," - said Smyshlyaeva.
According to her, the norms of the general law on artificial intelligence will be tied to practical cases.
Recall that recently Ekaterina Smyshlyaeva published what is referred to as the skeleton of the draft law, outlining the main innovations of the future AI law. It states that the creation of fully autonomous artificial intelligence systems will be prohibited in Kazakhstan. More details can be found here.
