Conference report: New technologies and AI – legal and practical aspects of the ecosystem of confidence, 16–17 October 2020, Poland (online)

Abstract

On 16–17 October 2020, an online conference entitled ‘New technologies and artificial intelligence – Legal and practical aspects of the ecosystem of confidence’ was organized by the Academy of Law of New Technologies and the Chair of Information, Media and Intellectual Property Law of the Institute of Law and Economics of the Pedagogical University in Krakow, and the National Information Processing Institute – National Research Institute, and the Chair of Civil Law and Private International Law of the Faculty of Law and Administration of the University Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński. Patrons of the event were: the Digital Poland Project Centre; the Patent Office of the Republic of Poland; the International Review of Law, Computers & Technology; sztucznainteligencja.org.pl; the Legal and Scientific Information Center; and the Cracow Bar Association of Attorneys at Law. This was the second edition of an annual scientific event bringing together scientists, practitioners, and enthusiasts of new technologies and law from all over Poland. Due to the pandemic, it took the form of a virtual meeting. As for the statistics, they were quite impressive (especially considering the fact that the event took place on Friday and Saturday). The conference was well attended, with 53 speakers and about 180 listeners. The main objectives of the event were to analyse the latest trends in new technologies, including AI (in particular the impact of the COVID 19 pandemic on the deployment of new technologies in the public and business spheres); to provide a summary of Polish legislative plans in this field; and to analyse the approaches of various expert bodies operating within international organizations such as the European Union or the Council of Europe. The conference also sought to show that new technologies are a cross-cutting issue that affect every area of law: from private to public and from intellectual property law through to procedural law and criminal law. Finally, the aim of the conference was to gather in one place and connect the experts involved: lawyers – both practitioners and theoreticians – with engineers (data processing specialists and analysts). The above objectives stemmed from the basic assumption that guided the conference organizers: new technologies constitute a multidisciplinary space where technological aspects mix, overlap, and intermingle with ethical and legal aspects. Therefore, one of the conclusions that resounded from the speeches was that anyone who wants to deal