The Role of Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare and Society | HIMSS

Artificial intelligence (AI) has transformed the way we do business and our everyday lives. Virtual assistants, computer-aided diagnosis and clinical decision support are just a few examples of how AI in healthcare has transformed the sector.

Yet, there is a dark side of AI. The malicious use of AI can create significant problems for the healthcare sector and beyond. AI may be developed with a malicious purpose in mind, or AI may be exploited by adversaries with a malicious purpose – in other words, currently available technology may be intentionally misused.

Checks and Balances in Innovation While many view AI as a panacea, it is not without faults. Through the use of AI, a machine may make mistakes that a human may never make. For reasons such as these, it is important to keep in mind the concept of “man and machine” instead of “man versus machine.” The healthcare sector needs to be involved in a dialogue to take an active role in leveraging innovative technologies such as AI, but with a system of checks and balances.

AI systems of today often contain a number of exploitable vulnerabilities. For example, data poisoning attacks may occur by introducing training data that causes a learning system to make mistakes or an adversary might introduce inputs that are designed to be misclassified by learning systems. Furthermore, the core of an AI system is its data processing and decision-making engine. The security and integrity of the data processing and decision-making engine, including inputs, rules and otherwise, are quite important. If any aspect is tampered with and if there is no human “check,” then it is quite possible that significant harm may occur. In the case of healthcare, this may result in potential harm, injury, or even death to a patient.