[GALA Valencia 2024] The Ethics and Challenges of Machine Interpreting in Community settings

“Without judging their respective « quality », decision making processes by humans and by algorithms are fundamentally and categorically different, make different mistakes, and might have different outcomes and therefore consequences. While societies and governments have considerable experience understanding human decision-making and its failures, they are only beginning to understand the flaws, limitations and boundaries of algorithmic decision-making.” (EU report – algorithms & human rights)”

The rise of Neural Machine Interpreting/Translation and AI brings the promise of solving the problem of accessing translation/interpretation services. Services can be made more uniformly available cheaper, addressing the multiplicity relating to access across different sectors. We would also be able to address the multiplicity relating to access in lesser diffusion/rare language combinations. This in turns means moving towards more equitable access to services and information beyond language barriers. However, the use of machine interpreting and translation and its various applications in public sector and community translation and interpreting raises a number of ethical concerns.

I will talk about the growing use of these technologies and how we are incorporating them into our workflow.

I will also suggest a decision tree for their use and ask questions relating to the pitfalls from their use

• perpetuating patterns of discrimination/oppression by our use of technology/AI?

• challenges to look into that we have not had to deal with before? accuracy and fidelity, confidentiality, transparency of data source, impartiality are among the most important In this presentation

I will suggest some approaches towards incorporating the benefits of NMT and AI into the provision of translation and interpretation services in public sector and community settings, while also addressing emerging ethical considerations. I will also present some suggested guidelines to make informed decisions in various settings as to the effective use of these technologies and briefly mention safeguards to be put in place to avoid pitfalls and challenges.

Host organization: Globalization and Localization Association