AI and ML governance

Regimes governing automated decision-making differ by jurisdiction and sector and are changing quickly. Anything affecting credit, employment, housing, insurance, healthcare, or education carries specific legal obligations — involve Legal & Risk and qualified counsel rather than treating it as an engineering question.

Define intended use before evaluating anything

Write down what the system is for, what it is not for, who is affected by its output, and what happens when it is wrong. Most AI failures are use outside intended scope by someone who did not know the scope existed.

Then decide the consequence tier, because it sets everything after it:

• Advisory — a human decides, the model suggests. Lightest oversight.
• Assistive — the model acts, a human reviews before effect.
• Autonomous — the model acts with effect. Highest bar, and rarely appropriate where a person is materially affected.