AVATARI KAO PRUŽAOCI USLUGA: MEĐUNARODNOPRAVNI ASPEKTI

We will consider in this paper the legal issues associated to the use of avatars in service provision procedures. Namely, the service sector is constantly searching for process optimization and increasing efficiency, and avatars can be used to provide a wide range of services in both the public and private sectors. Their advantages are numerous and some of them are the increase in efficiency and internal process optimization, the elimination of human errors, corruption and fraud, the possibility of providing more accessible and inclusive services with a high degree of personalization. In the European Union, artificial intelligence and avatars are used in the provision of three levels of services in the public sector, namely those of an economic, non-economic and social nature. In Serbia, we already see avatars as service providers of customer services in the public sector in the form of so-called chatbots, e.g. to assist taxpayers with various tax matters, such as filing tax returns, paying taxes and obtaining tax forms through the IRS website or for information regarding enrollment, scholarships and other education-related matters through the Ministry of Education bot, of science and technological development of Serbia. Certainly, the benefits of using these systems were first noticed by the private sector in areas such as e-marketing and e-sales. Considering the technical characteristics and purpose, avatars whose functioning is based on reactive, weak VI with limited memory are on a legal level with slightly more advanced mediums for delivering pre- typed information or ordering goods whose function is thereby exhausted. Because of the above, general or special regulations that regulate the circulation of the services and goods in question are relevant for all related issues. In contrast to this, the legal situation arising from the use of avatars whose functioning is based on intelligent, strong, super VI is much more complex because it opens up numerous issues such as those related to privacy protection and informed consent, but also status issues of the VI itself, which is why the spectrum of authoritative of legal regulations is much wider here. After the introductory clarifications of the research subject and the current situation in the development of the regulatory framework, in the next part of the paper we will consider some of the general legal challenges of the use of VIs that are also transposed to avatars. In this part of the paper, we will also present the main regulatory frameworks that seek to legally regulate the issue of the use of VI. After defining the general challenges and regulatory frameworks, we make the discussion concrete by considering issues that are directly relevant to the legal aspects of the use of avatars. In this part of the paper, we proposed the definition of this entity and explained the legal significance of its elements. The potential risks of using avatars in the virtual space and metaverse are presented, while ways to overcome them are also discussed.