Flint Global

On Sky News this morning to discuss the French political situation and what comes next. With Barnier’s government at risk of being toppled today, the political crisis that started with the snap parliamentary election called in June continues to deepen. Regardless of the result of the vote, an election cannot be called before July next year - meaning that in the short term France is stuck with a very fragmented parliament. Where does this leave President Macron? He still has cards in his hand and will appoint the next PM, but his options are limited. As for the budget, a shutdown is unlikely - there are ways to maintain continuity. But continuity is not enough. The next government will be under even more pressure to address France’s unsustainable public finance trajectory.

It was a great pleasure to be invited by GSMA APAC to dinner with industry and government figures and to then moderate a panel on scams at GSMA's Digital Nation Summit Manila. I was struck by the dedication I found towards using digital technologies to advance inclusion and raise living standards in the Philippines. The threat of scams is one of the biggest obstacles to this ambition because of the damage it does to trust in digital services. On the panel, Justice Reyes Jr. of the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center (CICC), John Gonzalez of PLDT Enterprise, and Lito Villanueva of RCBC discussed how government and different sectors are collaborating to address the threat. This includes through both developing tools such as the use of device location to flag suspicious transactions and through implementing educational initiatives to inform both users and businesses on the threat.

💥NEW PAPER FROM ME: A Comprehensive Analysis of AI Regulation in India💥 "What's happening on AI regulation in India? What should the government do?" If these questions pique your interest. I'd like to share a new paper I've published with Carnegie India. It captures the general sentiments on AI regulation and suggests a policy roadmap for India based on extensive consultations and research. Some of our findings were surprising — turns out government, industry and civil society agree on many aspects of AI regulation. That makes me hopeful that we can convert consensus into action. But there are some roadblocks — though we have some intuitions about the novel risks of AI, we don't yet have empirical evidence of harm in the Indian context to frame new regulations. There's also the complex task of figuring out where the gaps lie in existing laws, and how to plug them in efficient ways. Having worked in technology law for over a decade, I can tell you this is no mean feat (see Part 2). Another concern is the lack of state capacity. Expertise and enforcement is a challenge. We need to think up agile, flexible and innovative frameworks to supplement current capacity (an AI Safety Institute for India perhaps?). Overcoming these obstacles will require a multi-fold strategy. For a country like India, we recommend a targeted and iterative approach that blends capacity building, risk assessments and self regulation with some government oversight (see Part 4 of the paper). We also identify key agencies that should be involved in this process. This is the first comprehensive analysis of AI regulation in India, so we welcome your feedback and hope you find it informative, accessible and useful. Finally, I have two requests: 1. Please share this paper with anyone interested in AI policy - if nothing else, the 100+ footnotes are a treasure trove of resources.  2. If you're looking for someone from India to speak to a global audience about AI policy, please reach out. We want to ensure that AI regulations are interoperable and that we are engaged with our counterparts around the world. As always, many thanks to my co-author Shatakratu, the anonymous interviewees and reviewers, and to the entire Carnegie India team that helped put this paper together!