How to stop assassin robot attack

A March report by a UN panel said the first autonomous drone strikes had already taken place in Libya. Still, a United Nations convention in Geneva last week failed to regulate the use of killer robots on the battlefield. Mint explains the concept that has long worried rights groups.

So, what are killer robots?

The idea of ​​killer robots has been widely explored in science fiction films including Terminator, Blade Runner and RoboCop. While there is no clear definition, and we are nowhere near the level of science fiction development, killer robots include machines that can make their own decisions with little or no human involvement. Collectively, these weapons fall under lethal auto-nomous weapon systems (LAWS), which can include bombs, dog-like robots, and more that use AI and other digital technologies to make decisions on the battlefield. can do. This does not include drones, which are operated remotely by pilots.

What is the Convention on Arms?

The Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW), which came into force in 1983, is an international agreement under the United Nations. It is also known as the Inhumane Weapons Convention and seeks to prevent the use of certain weapons that may be considered “highly harmful”, and as of 2001, weapons that “can cause indiscriminate effects”. The group held a conference on 17 December, which sought to control the use of LAWS in modern warfare. A coalition of NGOs said that despite calls for a “clear majority” to negotiate a law, the committee fell “shockingly short” of an outcome.

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Photo: Reuters

Why is there a need for legislation to regulate the use of LAWS?

Rights groups have argued that allowing robots to make life or death decisions is inhumane and should not be allowed. In addition, they note that such algorithmic decisions are not reliable because they may be subject to algorithmic biases, and humans would not have control over profiling and decision robots. It can also lower the threshold of war.

Why do countries want these robots?

Many armies want to use such machines because it will reduce the number of human soldiers who will be put at risk. In addition, robots are often thought to be more efficient, can traverse terrain that humans may not be able to do, and can be used for things like crowd control. But more importantly, many proponents of killer robots for combat argue that using robots instead of humans could significantly reduce the cost of war, while those against it argue that it would allow them to escape from the battlefield. Compassion comes at the cost of removal.

Why is the treaty being opposed?

While there are many countries that are not opposed to the disarmament of such weapons, those that have invested in such technologies oppose it. One of the arguments is that nations want any decision on the matter to be unanimous, while the US has argued that existing laws are sufficient to govern LAWS. The country has also proposed a “non-binding code of conduct” for countries using killer robots. The United Nations group agreed to meet for 10 days in 2022 to discuss how to control the use of killer robots.

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