Author: mattgold

As part of the conference “Investigating the Kill Cloud – Information Warfare, Autonomous Weapons & AI · 10 Years Disruption Network Lab” (29.11–1.12.2024, Berlin), Jutta Weber will host the panel “Disarming the Kill Cloud”. The panel includes talks by:

Lucy Suchman (Professor Emerita, Lancaster University, UK/CA), Erik Reichborn-Kjennerud (Senior Research Fellow, Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, NO), Marijn Hoijtink (Associate Professor in International Relations, Principle Investigator PLATFORM WARS, University of Antwerp, NL/BE) and Elke Schwarz (Associate Professor, Queen Mary University London, UK).

More details on the panel and a full description of the conference can be found here:

https://www.disruptionlab.org/investigating-the-kill-cloud

We are delighted to announce that the conference “AI and warfare – Investigating the technological and political domains of current conflicts” co-organised by the Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society (HIIG) and the Department of Media Studies, University of Bonn as part of the Mehuco research network and will take place from Wednesday 16 to Friday 18 October, 2024 at the HIIG in Berlin.

Global conflicts and challenges to international security are among the most pressing issues of our time. Artificial intelligence is increasingly shaping the ways in which warfare is conducted, adding both complications and urgency to the issues caused by the current major geopolitical shifts. AI is one of the driving factors of technological change in warfare in general, with its major effects mainly related to new degrees of complexity in automation and new forms of human-machine interaction. On the one hand, this change introduces new capabilities in weapons systems, in particular in the fields of processing information, generating knowledge and the automation of decision-making. Most prominently, this results in a decreasing level of human intervention and control, thereby reshaping the relationship between human operators and autonomous weapons systems. On the other hand, AI-related developments do not only concern the kinetic dimension of warfare but also expand into what military theory calls the ‘information domain’. Shaping and controlling narratives has been an integral part of conflicts and warfare for a long time, with disinformation and propaganda campaigns utilising the most recent (media) technologies for this purpose. The functionality of AI applications will increasingly be integrated in these efforts, as can already be observed with the dissemination of manipulated content on social media. AI-based technologies are also deployed in cyber warfare, which is not limited to the singular hacking of a system, but rather targeted to directly affect whole digital military infrastructures or civilian entities in politics, the economy or research.

The objective of the conference is to explore these domains of modern warfare in order to develop a more accurate picture of the various effects of AI in military contexts. Another goal is to broaden the perspective of the military deployment of AI beyond questions of weapon systems and their control, by particularly looking at adversarial uses of AI in hybrid forms of warfare in the information domain. The conference particularly aims to develop and establish a dialogue between the research on these two domains that are often explored separately.

The preliminary programme can be found here.

If you wish to participate in the conference as a guest, we kindly ask you to register using the form via www.hiig.de/events/ai-warfare/ . 

You will receive an instant notification of registration. Please note that attendance is only possible if you also receive the confirmation of your registration in a separate mailing, as the number of participants is limited.

The paper “Meaningful Human Control” and Complex Human-Machine Assemblages – On the Limits of Ethical AI Principles in the Context of Autonomous Weapons Systems by Jens Hälterlein and Jutta Weber has recently been published in the journal “Ethics and Armed Forces”.

The open-access-publication is available here: https://www.ethikundmilitaer.de/en/magazine-datenbank/detail/01-2024/article/meaningful-human-control-and-complex-human-machine-assemblages-on-the-limits-of-ethical-ai-principles-in-the-context-of-autonomous-weapons-systems

Bibliographic information:

Jens Hälterlein & Jutta Weber: “Meaningful Human Control” and Complex Human-Machine Assemblages – On the Limits of Ethical AI Principles in the Context of Autonomous Weapons Systems. In: Ethics and Armed Forces, 1/2024, pp. 52-59.

From May 22 to 24, the conference “Imaginations of Autonomy – On Humans, AI-Based Weapon Systems and Responsibility at Machine Speed” took place at Paderborn University. A detailed report can be found here: https://stopkillerrobots.medium.com/imaginations-of-autonomy-on-humans-ai-based-weapon-systems-and-responsibility-at-machine-speed-c42a34fc4771

The Zeitenwende – marking a historical turning point – in the wake of Russia’s war against Ukraine necessitates no less than a reconception of the global peace order which had been established in the 20th century. At the same time, conflict scenarios in different regions of the world are being adapted to new types of AI-based weapons systems, some of which are already in use. How are geopolitical strategies and military realities changing in the face of these developments? What challenges are posed for democratic and defence policy regulations and what ethical questions are raised by the use of autonomous weapons? What risks arise with cyber attacks?

Against this background, the MEHUCO project at the University of Bonn and the Federal Agency for Civic Education jointly organise a lecture series, which provides answers to these questions. The series “Military force and artificial intelligence – War scenarios in the 21st century” explores the topics of arms control, autonomous weapons, cyberwar as well as ethical and legal aspects of military AI.

The lectures will take place in the Media Centre of the Federal Agency for Civic Education (Bundeskanzlerplatz 2, 53113 Bonn). You will find further information and the registration following this link.