🚨 Fascinating AI paper alert: Luciano Floridi publishes "Hypersuasion - On AI’s Persuasive Power and How to Deal With It," and it's a must-read for everyone in AI. Quotes:

"The relentless nature of AI’s hypersuasion, the magnitude of its scope, its availability, affordability, and degree of efficiency based on machine-generated content accurately tailored to individual users or consumers who spend increasing amounts of their lives onlife (both online and offline) in the infosphere overshadow its precursors, not only in terms of the depth of personalised influence but also for the potential scale of distribution and impact (Burtell and Woodside 2023). AI can and will be used, evermore commonly and successfully, to manipulate people’s views, preferences, choices, inclinations, likes and dislikes, hopes, and fears (...)"

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"For the moment, one may be tempted to conclude that AI and, indeed, any persuasive technology is neutral (perhaps with the only exception of the erosion of autonomy, more on this presently). However, as I argued elsewhere (Floridi 2023), this would be a mistake. It is much better to interpret it as double-charged, in tension between evil and good uses. The forces pulling in the wrong direction may be as strong as those pulling in the right. Arguably, if some autonomy is eroded (but see below), this may be to the advantage of the individuals persuaded, their societies, or the environment (...)"

“To conclude, AI has introduced a new and potent form of persuasion (hypersuasion). Preventing, minimising, and withstanding the negative impact of hypersuasion requires a comprehensive strategy, at the individual and societal level, that includes the protection of privacy, the development of fair competition among actors, transparent allocation of accountability, and good education and engagement. These and other factors – not highlighted in this article because they are more generally relevant, from responsible design to good social practices – require, as usual, ethical, and legal frameworks, regulatory oversight, implementation, and enforcement(...)."

➡ Link to the full paper below.

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