Ian was quoted in Lianhe Zaobao by Li Si Miao. Her article centred on the Personal Data Protection Commission’s (PDPC) new guidelines on the use of personal data in AI recommendation and decision-making systems, including the measures that companies should take when developing AI systems to protect customers’ personal data (p.6).

The article included Ian’s comments that some AI developers may want as much information as possible to train their AI systems. However, the Personal Data Protection Act 2012 (PDPA) requires organisations to collect data only for reasonable and appropriate purposes in the circumstances. Hence, the new advisory guidelines encourage organisations to practise data minimisation to reduce data protection risks. Another challenge is ensuring that the individual is kept informed of the purposes and the extent of collection, and has the option to opt out. The new advisory guidelines are useful as they provide practical examples of how proper and informed consent can be obtained in this space.