Transparency data

Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation Minutes - Board Meeting 2

Updated 12 October 2023

This transparency data was withdrawn on 16 October 2023

This content is no longer current. The Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation (CDEI) Advisory Board closed on 9 September 2023.

Thursday 31 January, 9am - 1pm

British Academy, 10-11 Carlton House Terrace, London SW1Y 5AH

Attendees:

• Roger Taylor (RT)
• Rt Revd Dr Steven Croft (SC)
• Edwina Dunn (ED)
• Prof Luciano Floridi (LF)
• Dame Patricia Hodgson (PH)
• Dr Susan Liautaud (SL)
• Baroness Kate Rock (KR)
• Richard Sargeant (RS)
• Kriti Sharma (KS)
• Dame Glenys Stacey (GS) (Board appointment starts March 2019)
• Prof Lord Robert Winston (RW)

Apologies:

• Dr Adrian Weller (AW)

Observers (CDEI staff):

• Nathan Bookbinder-Ryan (NBR)
• Jen Boon (JB)
• Ollie Buckley (OB)
• Sam Cannicott (SC)
• Natalie Davis (ND)
• Stephen Dunne (SD)
• Emily James (EJ)
• Alex Lawrence-Archer (ALA)
• Lara Macdonald (LM)
• Foluke Oshin (FO)
• Louise Pakseresht (LP)

Item 1: Chair’s Welcome

The Chair, RT, welcomed the Board and thanked the British Academy for hosting us. Alun Evans, CEO of British Academy, welcomed the Board expressing his support for the work of the CDEI.

Declaration of interests:

• RT asked if the Board had any interests to declare. KR declared an interest - KR is a senior advisor to Instinctif Partners which has been contracted to run a communications workshop for the CDEI. KR was not part of the procurement process.

Minutes from previous Board meeting:

• RT asked the Board to approve the draft minutes from the previous Board meeting.

Decisions:

• The Board agreed the minutes from the previous Board meeting.

Actions:

• CDEI to publish the minutes on gov.uk.

Chair’s update:

• RT provided an update to the Board on his recent activities, including recent events he has attended and interesting meetings.

Head of CDEI Team’s update:

• OB provided an update to the Board on operational progress the CDEI is making, including recruitment of staff to the CDEI and engagement with DCMS on the Spending Review process.
• The Board were interested in DCMS policy developments, in particular the Online Harms White Paper.

Actions:

• CDEI to provide the Board with a briefing on the Online Harms White Paper.

Item 2: CDEI Strategy

OB and ALA thanked the Board for their comments on the draft strategy. ALA summarised the comments received from Board members ahead of the meeting:

Ethical principles:

• The board agreed there is a need to agree a position to be included in the strategy, which would be refined over time. The strategy should clearly articulate the CDEI’s role in the space of ethical principles.
• The Board noted the Centre should not develop new principles, but should look at adopting and adapting others.
• There is a need to balance the use of accepted norms and language while also recognising where these are not always fit for purpose in relation to new technologies.
• The Centre may also want to consider to what extent it wants to seek alignment with Europe on these issues.
• The Ethics Steering Group will carry on working on this and finalise the position in time for publication of the strategy.

Actions:

• The ethics Steering Group to continue discussion to: 1) finalise position for the strategy, and 2) consider how to develop the Centre’s role in the space of ethical principles.

Terminology and language:

• The CDEI does not just cover issues around data and AI. It was suggested that, as a new organisation, the CDEI could develop its own terms or acronyms for capturing the scope of its work.

Actions:

• CDEI to consider the language and terminology used in the strategy.

General comments on strategy:

• There needed to be stronger language about the CDEI’s independence from government.
• The strategy should acknowledge the complexity of the challenge being looked at and balance the public, ethical and economic benefits.
• Public engagement is an important part of how the CDEI operates. However, the strategy should elaborate on what is possible in this area given the level of resource.
• Agility and flexibility is very important and should be designed in to the CDEI at this stage. For example, how will the CDEI respond to ‘live’ issues. This could include rapid response reports, small events and education days.
• The prioritisation questions are important to help guide how CDEI prioritises its work.

RT thanked the Board for their input and suggested he has 1-1 meetings with each Board member to further discuss the strategy.

Actions:

• CDEI to reflect Board comments in updated version of the strategy.
• CDEI to set up 1-1 meetings with RT and each Board member.

Timeline:

• The strategy will be published in mid/late March, potentially accompanied by an event.

Decisions:

• The Board agreed the timetable for publication.
• The Board agreed to hold an event to mark the publication.

Public engagement:

• OB set out the high-level plans for public engagement events. The first of these would be in March and we are partnering with Which? This event will provide Board members with an opportunity to participate in a public dialogue event and hear first-hand from members of the public about their views on data collection, profiling and technology. The public engagement events later in the year are likely to take place outside of London, in Edinburgh and Manchester.

Decision:

• The Board agreed with the proposals for Board-level public engagement events.

External Comms:

• The Board discussed how the CDEI engages with the media. A comms strategy will be presented at a future Board meeting.

Action:

• CDEI to present comms strategy at future Board meeting

Item 3: Reviews

RT introduced the two reviews, on bias and targeting.

Bias Review

The Bias Review team presented to the Board, talking through the review’s aims and goals:

• The review will identify where bias in algorithmic decision making may occur and how to mitigate against it;
• Specific sectors will be focused on, likely to be financial services, local government, recruitment and crime and justice.
• The review aims to establish clear processes whereby organisations using algorithmic decision making can understand what bias is, and how it can be detected and mitigated against.
• Stakeholder engagement will form a key part of the review, ensuring buy-in from key organisations in the selected sectors.

The Board discussed the risk register for the review, highlighting the need to secure partners, the importance of producing good-quality outputs, and the volume and complexity of the subject matter.

Governance:

• The Steering Group is made up of RS and KS, with AW as a secondary member. The first Steering Group will be convened in early February and will then meet every six weeks.

Board discussion:

• The Steering Group members present (KS, RS) congratulated the team on the work done to date.
• The Board suggested that procurement between providers of technology and buyers (public sector, banks etc) might also be examined.
• There was a question about whether healthcare should be added to the list of sectors.
• There was discussion about the types of outputs the review would produce. These would not just be a series of reports, but will include more tangible products.
• The Board asked about the CDEI’s access to the relevant data and algorithms. It is intended that partnering with key organisations in each sector will ensure access to relevant information.

Action:

• CDEI to incorporate Board comments into the review where appropriate.

Targeting Review

The Targeting Review team presented to the Board, talking through progress to date:

• This is a high-profile topic and targeting is an aspect of data ethics most people will encounter in their daily lives.
• The review will focus on how data is used to shape online experiences. There are a range of benefits and harms that could be explored, for example, opacity, transparency and control, missed opportunities and best practice, and autonomy.
• The scope of the review is currently being narrowed. The team is adopting an iterative approach: phase 1 will involve developing the work programme, gathering evidence and narrowing the scope of the review; phase 2 will likely involve in-depth public engagement research; phase 3 will likely involve developing and testing solutions and recommendations; and phase 4 will involve producing a final report and any other final outputs.

Governance:

• The Steering Group is made up of ED, PH, GS, AW. The first Steering Group will be convened in early February and will then meet generally every six weeks.

Board discussion:

• The Board were supportive of the iterative approach to scoping the project. The Board reiterated their desire to keep political campaigning in scope due to the unique position of the CDEI to engage with the topic and it’s high profile.
• The Board discussed the impact of false information spread online both through targeting and peer to peer and how significant it could be for society as well as the difficulty in approaching it.

Action:

• CDEI to incorporate Board comments into the review where appropriate.

Item 4: Analyse and Anticipate (A&A)

OB outlined the A&A function, highlighting its scope across the data landscape. The function will continue to be developed on an ongoing basis.

The A&A team presented on the details of this function of CDEI:

• A&A is an important complement to the reviews. The teams are currently looking at how best to fit these functions together and share information.
• A&A will be looking at high-level, systematic trends which is essential for the success of the CDEI. It will allow the CDEI to take a long-term view by spotting emerging risks.
• A&A will look across the landscape and help inform the topics the CDEI wants to prioritise. It may also result in recommendations.
• The key deliverables will be: an evolving map of the trends in the landscape (2019) and a state of the nation report (2020).

Governance:

• A Steering Group will be set up and various Board members have been invited to join.

Board discussion:

• The Board broadly agreed that A&A function should identify high-level risks and opportunities as well as do more detailed investigations on urgent or interesting topic but had a number of substantial comments.
• Engagement with stakeholders needs to be coordinated, but the Board did not think there was a need for a formal ‘advisory group’ or similar to be created do this. The Board emphasised the need to engage with a diverse range of different communities to create a comprehensive view of the landscape.
• The CDEI needs to engage closely with the public to understand what the greatest challenges are to building public trust, and how the perceptions of risks relate to actual risks and the current governance ability to mitigate them. The Board also emphasised the need for all CDEI outputs to be accessible and easy to understand.
• Reactive capacity needs to be embedded into the A&A. It should analyse and anticipate but also able to act.
• The Board commented that further work was needed to narrow the scope of the initial output.

Action:

• The A&A Steering Group (LF, GS, RW) to meet to refine the role of the A&A function and shape the initial output following the comments from the Board.

Item 5: Governance

OB introduced the draft Framework Agreement which sets out the governance arrangements between the CDEI and the DCMS. The document was developed in partnership between the CDEI and the DCMS Data Ethics Team (the sponsor team for CDEI). OB thanked GS and PH for their help with this. Farah Ahmed (FA) from the DCMS Data Ethics Team set out the role of DCMS as the sponsor department, the role of the Board and the CDEI’s independence, and the importance of this document to set out clearly and transparently how the two organisations will work together. It is intended the draft Framework Agreement would be approved today by the Board, and will then go to Ministers for final approval. It will then be published.

Board discussion:

• The Board were broadly content with the Framework Agreement.
• The Board queried the clause that allows government six months to respond to recommendations which they agreed seemed longer than usual. By comparison, the response time to select committees is three months.
• The Board noted that the Framework Agreement is intended to cover the period before the CDEI is placed on a statutory footing.

Action:

• CDEI to liaise with DCMS about whether the Framework Agreement could be amended to state that government must respond within three months rather than six months.

Item 6: Reporting

Forward Look

• ALA outlined the forward look document for 2019 and, in more detail, for the coming three months. This is an internal document for the CDEI which is only shared with our sponsor team at DCMS. ALA canvassed the Board for opinions on whether this was the right information to include.

Decisions:

• The Board agreed the level of information was right.

Risk Register

• ALA talked through the risk register for the CDEI. The Board noted risks around resourcing, budget and delivery and agreed the format of the risk register.

Budget 18/19

• ALA outlined our budget for the remainder of the financial year and the planned spend, noting that CDEI is likely to underspend against its budget by around £100,000. The Board noted the planned budget spend, requesting verbal clarification in a few areas, which was satisfactory.

Item 7: AOB

Board Papers

• A number of Board members have suggested the CDEI uses a Board app to manage and distribute Board papers. Others prefer traditional papers and hard copies.

Actions:

• CDEI to explore software solutions for Board papers.

Invitations to Board members

• OB asked the Board to note the CDEI policy about responding to speaking invitations if RT is unable to attend, suggesting the team would suggest an alternative Board member if appropriate. OB also asked the Board notify the CDEI team if they get invited to speak at events representing the CDEI.

Decision:

• The Board agreed to the recommended approach regarding speaking invitations.

Board communications

• The Board requested a separate Board distribution list.

Actions:

• CDEI team to create a Board distribution list.