AI assistants are becoming more confident, direct, and less emotionally supportive in their default communication. These changes may seem subtle, but they matter because most people use AI systems as they are presented to them. At the scale these technologies are now used, even small shared shifts in tone can shape how people understand trust, authority, uncertainty, and what they expect “good” communication with AI, or even with other humans, to sound like.
We are happy to share our workshop toolkit for reflecting and discussing systemic and ethical challenges of developing digital public services. In the workshop we make use of speculative cinema to provoke reflections.
Reliability and trustworthiness are essential in research, but “truth” is often shaped by context, power dynamics, and participant vulnerability. Studying migrants’ trust in digital public services highlighted how uncertainty and self-censorship can affect responses. Rather than claiming absolute truth, researchers should acknowledge limitations, practice reflexivity, and be transparent about how knowledge is produced.
Finland is preparing legislative changes to expand the use of AI and automation in public digital services. We responded with recommendations on human oversight, stakeholder consultation, digital sovereignty, and maintaining public sector expertise. This post summarizes our key proposals and includes our full comment in Finnish.
By Avanti Chajed, Johanna Ylipulli, and Anne Häkkinen Trust has been a central element to this project from the beginning.
Enter your email to join our mailing list.
We have sent a confirmation email to your inbox.
Please check your email to confirm.
