Towards a research ethics of real-world experimentation with emerging technology

Testing emerging technologies, such as autonomous vehicles, predictive crime analytics, and smart city interventions under real-world conditions is an important strategy for robust and responsible technology development. However, the moral responsibilities of researchers towards the public when conducting such real-world experiments are often left unaddressed and unregulated. This article argues that there are problematic inconsistencies in research ethics demands and protections across different categories of research and development with emerging digital technologies. This differential treatment is problematic since there are no meaningful differences to justify it, and it creates the possibility of regulatory evasion at the cost of populations’ due protection. Hence, I argue that this differential treatment should be amended by harmonizing research ethics demands. In doing so, this paper contributes to several ongoing scholarly debates on the limits of current research ethics guidelines and protocols in the face of novel technologies and research formats.