FTC, DOJ & European agencies seek ‘fair and honest’ use of AI
Artificial intelligence has the attention of regulators both in the U.S. and Europe.
The latest example of why arrived on Tuesday when the Federal Trade Commission, alongside international antitrust enforcers and the Department of Justice, Antitrust Division, issued a statement affirming a commitment to protecting competition across the AI ecosystem.
The goal is to ensure effective competition that provides “fair and honest treatment for both consumers and businesses.”
The joint statement noted that while AI has the potential to become one of the most significant technological developments of the past couple of decades, it also raises competition risks that may prevent the full benefits of AI from being realized.
All four antitrust enforcers pledged in the joint statement to remain vigilant for potential competition issues and expressed their determination to use available powers to safeguard against tactics that would undermine fair competition or lead to unfair or deceptive practices in the AI ecosystem.
To assess competition risks to AI, the joint statement stressed the importance of focusing on how emerging AI business models drive incentives, and ultimately behavior.
Competition questions in AI will be fact-specific but several common principles — fair dealing, interoperability, and choice — will generally help enable competition and foster innovation, as outlined in the joint statement.
“While potential harms may be felt across borders, the joint statement makes it clear that U.S. decision-making will always remain independent and sovereign,” the FTC said in a news release highlighting the joint statement.
Collaborating on this endeavor were:
—Lina Khan, chair of the FTC
—Jonathan Kanter, assistant attorney general with the U.S. Department of Justice
—Sarah Cardell, chief executive officer of the U.K. Competition and Markets Authority
—Margrethe Vestager, executive vice-president and competition commissioner for the European Commission
Views of US-UK economic ties
Coinciding with these points from regulators, leading British and American businesses have given a new vote of confidence in the strength of transatlantic ties on trade, business and economic relationships despite an uncertain political context with national elections this year in both the U.K. and U.S.
Released on Wednesday, the fourth annual Transatlantic Confidence Index from BritishAmerican Business and Bain & Company showed U.S. companies’ confidence in the U.K. as a place to do business has stabilized this year after two back-to-back years of sharp drops in sentiment.
Factors that experts said drove those declines included political and economic turbulence in Britain, with multiple changes of prime minister, previous bouts of market turmoil and the ongoing impact of the U.K.’s departure from the EU.
With U.K. companies’ confidence in the US business environment also little changed at high levels, experts said the combined British and American business sentiment on the transatlantic economic corridor remains firmly positive.
The headline BAB-Bain Transatlantic Confidence Index for 2024 included a score of 7.1 out of 10, up from 7.0 last year — boosted by U.S. investors’ confidence in the U.K. ticking up to 6.6, from 6.5 in 2023.
The index for U.K. businesses’ confidence in the U.S. was unchanged at 8.4 out of 10.
In a further signal of the continued, underlying strength of both markets and of the US-UK economic relationship, BAB and Bain noted that investors from both sides of the Atlantic report stable or increasing confidence, and plan to maintain or increase investment levels in both countries.
Experts explained the findings suggest a current calming of conditions after a series of major disruptions for both U.S. and U.K. business in recent years — including the COVID-19 pandemic, resurgent inflation and higher costs of doing business in both nations — as well as pointing to cautious optimism over AI and its potential boost to productivity.
“This year’s results underscore the strong confidence in the transatlantic corridor, which is encouraging news,” BritishAmerican Business CEO Duncan Edwards said in a news release. “Companies on both sides of the Atlantic are advocating for increased economic collaboration and policy stability. However, concerns remain over the tax environment and the cost of doing business in both countries.
“In fact, ensuring tax competitiveness is now the top issue for US investors in the U.K. The new Labour government has insisted that growth is one of its biggest priorities and we urge them to create a favourable environment for attracting greater investment from the U.S.,” Edwards continued.
Jonathan Frick, partner at Bain & Company in London, added: “The U.K.-U.S. corridor is a critical foundation for the future prosperity of Britain and America. The vital importance of these relationships is why Bain partnered with BritishAmerican Business on this study for a fourth year in a row.
“In an era where businesses are dealing with unprecedented disruptions, from geopolitics to the breakneck pace of technological change with AI, at Bain we’re working every day to help clients reinvent their businesses and their strategy to meet this moment,” Frick said. “Against that a backdrop of big challenges, it’s greatly encouraging that our findings show the continuing strength of transatlantic business and economic ties, which are more crucial now than ever.
“At the same time, there are important messages for governments in this year’s results, in terms of the importance for business of stable policies and the need to continue to nurture and build our trading relationship in what is an ever more interdependent world,” Frick went on to say.