Charter for Emerging Technology

Lacking a mobile phone, I am familiar with, but have never used, a QR code.
Following some other recent discussion on this forum, I came across the term 'consequence scanning', followed by a comment "I don't know what consequence scanning is, but....", and since it is flagged in the introduction to the 'full draft here' for the consultation document, I checked it out.
Whilst the consultation document aspires to "using plain language", the explanation of consquence scanning in the link is far from plain. It appears to be a management technique for assessing the results of scanning a QR code in terms of its effectiveness for the managers of the QR code.
I would've assumed it might refer to the data consequences for the scanner of performing this action.
This is one of the major issues of 'emerging technology'.
It does not seem to be the dangers of illegal e-scooters being ridden illegally on the pavement, for example, but the consquences of businesses, services, government departments et al, being run by MBA qualified people, who have little of no knowledge of either the service or trade their department runs, only so-called 'good' management practices which maximise efficiency and profit for the management.
It harks back to the days when Google advocated 'only do good things', rather than pervade our every click with unwanted advertising, and Steve Jobs was still alive and basically an aging hippy.
Those days are over, and we need to be aware of and equipped to fight this creeping exclusive automation of entitlements and services. Unfortunately access to the means to do this are also being denied us progressively by the same management tools and self-interested management services. Often the only weapon left seems to be abstention from the demanded technology.
Pret a Manger has quite a good reputation I gather, but no amount of promotion will persuade me to 'subscribe' to a digital system that allows me up to 5 cuppas a day of anything. Well, almost anything :)

Diversity with EU and US?
You must be kidding. These Countries are falling a part, with families been destroyed and respect and rights been transformed with fake talks.
Big Tecks been a dictatorship.

All Lives Matters and everyone is free to choose what to do with their sexualit without imposing it to everybody.

Taking the streets with violence, hurting and killing people, fire historic buildings and statues.
Sick arguments from sick and insane people.

Privacity, freedom and free speech are crucial in a democracy.
We cannot trust or information in the digital systems anymore.
Big Tecks are using us like a slave robot s.
If someone wants or information, they need to ask us and inform for what purposes.

The principles look ok, but I think you should add a goal to review who is gaining the most out of the new technology in terms of output, benefits and financial advantages, to make sure that all the different slices of the population can profit form it.

As usual, all general bla bla bla, but have you consulted with small businesses? What are their technological needs? Have you got idea of how many businesses have strong security in their technology and don't release by accident their customers data? Have you created a comission of Londoners and asked them if they want their data to be released to the authoririties? To the police? It is very good to say we don't want to discriminate but, haven't you heard that people don't take vaccines because they don't trust authorities? And you think that they are going to be happy relasing their private data to the authorities? You create this draft so we cna comment on it, but what data have you collected to create this draft? Or you just 'cut and paste' from the GDPR text? It shows you don't have any idea what's going on in London and with londoners.

For any implementation of new technologies especially within the Artificial Intelligence area, it is important that the four values from the EU white paper on Trustworthy AI, 2019 p. 141:

1. Respect for human autonomy. AI systems should not unjustifiably subordinate, coerce, deceive, manipulate, condition or herd humans. Instead, they should be designed to augment, complement and empower human cognitive, social and cultural skills.
2. Prevention of harm. AI systems should neither cause nor exacerbate harm or otherwise adversely affect human beings. This entails the protection of human dignity as well as mental and physical integrity. AI systems and the environments in which they operate must be safe and secure.
3. Fairness. The development, deployment and use of AI systems must be fair. The substantive dimension implies a commitment to ensuring equal and just distribution of benefits and costs, and ensuring that individuals and groups are free from unfair bias, discrimination and stigmatisation.
4. Explicability. This means that processes need to be transparent, the capabilities and purpose of AI systems openly communicated, and decisions – to the extent possible – explainable to those directly and indirectly affected.

They are a great benchmark.

Obtained from:

High-Level Expert Group on AI of the EU. (2019) “Ethics guidelines for trustworthy AI | Shaping Europe’s digital future”. Available at: https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/library/ethics-guidelines-trus…

Security needs to be built into the approach to tech right from the start. If there is going to be mass collection of citizen data, authorities need to publicly demonstrate why this data is needed and how it will be kept secure, with safeguards in place in the event of an attack/breach.

Saying “we will comply with GDPR” isn’t enough. We expect all authorities to comply with the law but if we want public support and confidence for our systems in London, we need to be exemplars of excellence in how we deal with citizens’ data, or we risk losing the trust of the public.

Tech should be used positively: to make people’s lives better & easier, not (for example) to target perceived undesirable behaviour such as begging/homelessness or protest. This risks undermining public confidence.

“Communicating with local communities” needs to include consultation with a diverse range of groups and not relying solely on social media and tech to do this (eg using leaflets through doors.) Need to involve civil society groups, expert organisations and privacy/tech experts.

Respecting diversity needs to consider the needs of people who don’t have smartphones and/or don’t want to engage with tech, especially when it comes to access to services.

“Working in the open” should be more than an aspiration - it should be a commitment. Not doing this risks undermining public trust, especially when it comes to areas like surveillance systems and data collection.

This says nothing about London's objectives for emerging technology.
These principles are weak. They are worded in such a way that anything could be deemed consistent with these principles.

Working in the Open: you say you aspire to share thinking and work collaboratively. Why not we WILL share thinking and work collaboratively?

You "aspire" to use plain language and then in the next principle you talk about "consequence scanning." That fails the plain language test.

Respecting diversity: What does diversity have to do with it? You've decided diversity is a good thing, so you've wedged it in to the principles. What you talk about in this principle is, rightly, about respecting human rights and individual freedom. Or perhaps the key idea here is benefit to users.

I don’t know what “consequence scanning” is - I assume it’s considering what might happen after the introduction of (by definition unknowable) new technology. It’s probably more sensible to have excellent feedback and response analysis after the technology is trialled, as it’s impossible to see the future I think.
Also if we want plain language, that’s not a good start! To have something so mysterious in the key principles.

The charter doesn't contain anything to actually encourage innovation, jobs or skills. It is guidance to partially steer things that will happen anyway, but it doesn't say anything that will create a new innovation, job or training opportunity in London.

I would like to see more initiatives for tech being made more usable, I don't think free or low cost internet is enough, we need to be looking at alternatives to smart phones and keyboards/screens. The term "digital exclusion" has been used but I think that tech is so pervasive now that, unless it becomes far more accessible (in the sense of usabilty), then it will lead to people's exclusion from society in general.

This initiative flashes a huge 'red flag' warning to me despite being modern and forward thinking.
This is that anything technological commissioned by the UK Government or Local Government inevitably turns our to be a huge waste of taxpayers / council tax payers money 'poured down the drain' for grossly over-budget products / schemes that do not function satisfactorily or beneficially.
The 'rule of thumb' ought to be that if you cannot purchase it ready-made from the likes of Microsoft, Apple or Google for a reasonable price, drop the idea altogether - there are already overflowing 'graveyards of technology' commissioned by Government, the NHS or Local Government.
There are too many far more important priorities on which London Local Government sorely needs to spend money rather than wasting it on technologies that we know before you start will never work to the benefit of Londoners.

For some months or even a year, Pret a Manger has been trying to persuade its customers to pay £20 a month, after the first free month, for up to five cuppas a day. However, one needs to be savvy with the use of QR codes and how to scan them. I am a senior citizen but also a computer user for about 35 years, and am most definitely not savvy with this new system. Having tried to scan a QR code in one of Pret's cafes with my smartphone and not succeeded, I attempted to apply online from my Windows 10 computer, where typing is so much easier than on a smartphone. Having provided my financial details for debiting a month later, I have still to discover my personalised QR code. A request for help by Email to the company has still left me in the dark without a personalised QR code, in spite of their instant response.

It's all very well implementing so-called 'technologies' which as we know are essentially multinational and other tech commercial companies pushing their powerful private owned profiteering wares into and onto the market in order to gain hugely lucrative contracts out of governments and local authorities. Didn't we just see this with the 'enormous debacle debt' of 'track and trace apps' and such during the UK's Covid pandemic, not to mention previous failures of technology within the NHS and other public services. As a private user of a Mac laptop I have issues with computer companies building within their home user devices redundancies of use which over a mere few short years causes computers to be deemed 'out of date' where computer companies make it more and more difficult to access previously easily accessed sites 'verboten' to older used computers ~ that is, until the home user is forced to buy a new up to date all-tech all-dancing latest devise. In an age of avoiding wastage and 'the green economy' where 'scrapping the old to buy the new' creates its own carbon footprint tech firms should be dissuaded, even legislated against, in causing home and other tech devises to become too shortly obsolete and gradually unusable. I have to say this is the same with the automobile industry where I'm afraid I see ULEZ exactly the same in the 'scrapping the old to buy the new' when, surely, some intelligent tech protocol might be innovated that could tweak older so-called polluting vehicles to be conversant with needful emission levels rather than with wholesale wasteful scrapping.

New technology is all very fine & useful. Unfortunately its use is being forced on us whether we want it or not, by laziness, or design, on the part of businesses, government departments, banks, the NHS, leisure services etc. Their thirst for our data is more important than their providing us with a service.
I use digital devices for all kinds of things, including communication, collaboration, creation, shopping online & so on, though not social media. I choose not to have a mobile phone, 'smartphone', or tablet, and so have neither iOS or android to accomodate an 'app'. As a result, I am denied getting a doctor's appointment, paying to park my car in most of London, being able to pay for goods online with my debit card, or even buying a loaf of bread around the corner (if I was stupid enough to pay their prices!).
There are two major problems with existing and emergent technology (internet of things etc): one is security, or lack of it, the other is the insistence of its use and refusal to provide alternative routes to paying for something, booking an appointment, or proving you are who you claim to be.
As far as I am aware, it is not yet a legal requirement to possess a cellphone, but it should be against the law to discriminate against those who are unable or choose not to use one.

Protect tech from being used for wrong purposes like hate speech or violence, etc

Add equality, diversity and inclusion of people and ideas at all levels.

Technology that is fit for purpose for women also. Book Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez highlights how technology is built with reference man in mind, so airbags and seat belts and heart attacks research is all based around men, and are actually harmful and not fit for women due to the data gap. Surveys, focus groups and research is needed to have technology that is useful and add value. (Helps to avoid a situation like money spend for a 6month hill at Marble Arch)

Safety and privacy - tech should be safe for adults, teenagers and children

Return on investment from the technology, needs to add value, tangible or intangible benefits for people

There are epidemic levels of racism & misogyny, both online & in person. We are failing to point out the elephant in the room.

Is it of no coincidence, that child sex abuse has grown dramatically according to National Crime Agency, because, mainstream sites like Pornhub & others for decades have been allowed to host & profit from child sex abuse. Mastercard broke ties with Pornhub after finding child rape on its site. Pornhub is being sued by 35 people, including those whose rape, when a child was used to bring profit to Pornhub.
Popular search terms include: 'barely legal' & 'tiny teen'

There was an outcry a few years ago at Exhibit B at The Barbican that featured black actors in chains.
Yet, when thousands of videos exist of white men 'abusing slaves' tied-up black women; a racist &/or misogynist will / even has it's own whole genre 'race play, 'slave porn'

Lesbians have been reduced to a 'porn category', 'lesbian' has been colonised, humiliated, objectified, sexualised. Lesbians reject the word lesbian, many because of male colonisation. Causing, straight men to sexually harass lesbians constantly, male violence, lack of representation. Now straight males are lesbians.

Ofsted have found shockingly high amounts of sexual assault in schools. 88% of porn shows actual male violence against women.

What happens if these people witness sexual violence in real life, will it turn them on. Is this why rape convictions are so low?

What is feeding incels

Pornhub is more visited than Amazon, Twitter, Instagram etc. combined.

Rape & sexual assault in schools is at shockingly high levels.