Ethics & Law for Artificial Intelligence - Micro-credential

The development of AI and its application in business contexts raises ethical and legal questions which require serious consideration. This Micro-credential will provide complementary discussions of legal and ethical perspectives on pertinent AI-related issues for managers. The most prominent ethical issue is privacy, automated inferences about persons (e.g. employees or customers), and the framework of contextual integrity. This leads to the law of data protection, which creates a regulatory framework for the processing of information on individuals and is therefore relevant to business analytics, online marketing, and content regulation.

There is also a need for ethical consideration of human engagement with virtual agents, including understanding criteria for artificial agency, artificial creativity, autonomous decision-making and responsibility of AI, the human interaction with virtual agents. This will be complemented by a detailed exploration of relevant law. Intellectual property is a key enabler, both in allowing for the ownership of AI tools but also in the possibility of AIs as creators or owners of content. Tort law rules that determine liability for damage caused by defective or mis-applied AI will also be considered. Contract law will be examined, particularly with regard to contracting with AI systems or between AIs.

There are also wider ethical concerns relating to justice, fairness, and inclusion in the development and implementation of AI, and the preservation of human dignity and meaningful work in AI-assisted workplaces. This will be connected to constitutional and human rights law, particularly where the underlying data used for AI tools contains or perpetuates bias and discrimination, and the developing regulation of AI.

Finally, the Micro-credential concludes with a reflection on what constitutes trustworthy uses of AI, and how AI systems may breach ethical rules, whether deliberately or not. How the law might respond to this will be considered through a practical case study of how AI systems may breach competition law by colluding with other AIs to fix prices or other aspects of market offerings, even if this is not a part of their design.

NB: A minimum number of applicants is required to deliver this micro-credential, if this number is not met the micro-credential may be postponed or may not be delivered.

Applicants must be over 21 years of age.

A strong Level 8 undergraduate is required (not necessarily in computer science).

Applications can be considered using Recognition of Prior Learning.

From the 1st April, 2024 you can apply for any University of Galway Micro-credential through our Online Application Portal.

When completing your application please make sure to apply under CPC 1 (Postgrad CPD in Software Engineering & Database Technologies) in the drop-down menu after selecting Standalone Module- Continuing Professional Development.

For this micro-credential, please copy and paste or type this into the text box under Module Name: CT5185

12 weeks

The mode of study is online learning. There will be online lecture recordings.

Academic Year 2024/25, Semester TBC