Session organized by the Working Group on Business and Human Rights Brief description of the session: The Working Group on Business and Human Rights will present a report to the UN Human Rights Council in June 2025. The report will seek to identify current strategies, policies, and practices, and remaining gaps and challenges to address adverse human rights impacts linked to the procurement and deployment of artificial intelligence (AI) systems by States and non-tech businesses.
The report aims to clarify the respective duty and responsibility of States and non-tech businesses to protect and respect human rights, as well as the roles of other relevant stakeholders, including civil society, human rights defenders, academia, trade unions and national human rights institutions, in the context of the evolving landscape of AI procurement and deployment. As the report focuses on the procurement and deployment of AI systems by States and non tech business enterprises, therefore it does not cover issues related States developing and deploying their own AI systems, and related to tech business enterprises developing and deploying AI systems.
It seeks to explore the following items:
how States can further enhance efforts to safeguard human rights when procuring and deploying AI systems;
how non-tech businesses can further incorporate human rights focus in their deployment of AI in their business operations, products and services, including though comprehensive and robust human rights due diligence processes;
what grievance mechanisms exist for rightsholders that have been affected by AI procured by States or businesses, and how they can be strengthened; and
the essential role of human rights defenders to support States and businesses in identifying human rights risks and preventing harm in this context.
Key objectives of the session:- Identify key issues, actors, practices and trends that should be covered in the Working Group’s report to the Human Rights Council;
- Highlight promising policies, frameworks or regulations at the national, regional and international levels to address the human rights risks linked to the procurement and deployment of AI by States and non tech-businesses;
- Share emerging practices of non-tech business in including human rights impacts related to the procurement and deployment of AI systems in their human rights due diligence;
- Highlight key issues and challenges that are faced by CSOs, human rights defenders and workers in the context of AI systems deployed by States and non-tech businesses;
- Discuss what effective remedies are available for those whose human rights are adversely affected by AI applications used by States and non tech businesses .
Background of the discussion:- Advancing responsible development and deployment of generative AI, OHCHR ( Btech) project, 2023
- Taxonomy of Human Rights Risks connected to Generative AI, OHCHR (Btech project), 2023
- Mapping report: Human Rights and new and emerging digital technologies, OHCHR, 2024
- Recommendation on the ethics of Artificial intelligence, UNESCO 2021 and its Ethical impact Assessment, 2023
- G7 Toolkit for AI in the public sector, OECD and UNESCO, 2024
- Artificial intelligence and Human Rights, UN Global Compact Germany, 2024
- European Union AI Act, 2023
- The Framework Convention on Artificial Intelligence and human rights, democracy and the rule of law, Council of Europe, 2024
