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“Emerging issues and innovations” track as part of IFIP EGOV-CeDEM-EPART 2023 is open for submissions!

Anastasija Nikiforova Leave a comment

On behalf of the co-chair of “Emerging issues and innovations” track I sincerely invite everyone whose research focuses on new topics emerging in the field of ICT and public sector, including public-private ecosystems, to submit their work to this track, which is part of EGOV2023 – IFIP EGOV-CeDEM-EPART – one of the most recognized conference in e-Government, ICT and public administration and related topics!

The annual IFIP EGOV2023 will be hosted 5-7 September 2023 in Budapest by the Corvinus University of Budapest, Hungary. The conference focuses on e-Government, Digital Government, Open Government, Smart Government, GovTech, eParticipation and e-Democracy, and related topics like social media, digital transformation, Digital society, artificial intelligence, policy information, policy informatics, smart cities, and social innovation. Several types of submissions are possible, including completed research, ongoing research, reflections & viewpoints, posters, and workshops. The conference consists of 10 tracks:

  • General E-Government and E-Governance Track
  • General e-Democracy & e-Participation track
  • ICT and Sustainable Development Goals Track
  • Digital Society Track
  • AI, Data Analytics & Automated Decision Making Track
  • Smart Cities (Government, Districts, Communities & Regions) Track
  • Open data: social and technical aspects Track
  • Emerging Issues and Innovations Track
  • Digital and Social Media Track
  • Legal Informatics

And while the conference consists of 10 tracks you will definitely find relevant, my personal recommendation is “Emerging issues and innovations” track (chairs: Marijn Janssen, Anastasija Nikiforova, Dr. Csaba Csaki, Francesco Mureddu).


🎯🎯🎯 “Emerging issues and innovations” track focuses on new topics emerging in the field of ICT and public sector, including public-private ecosystems. Topics of interest include but are not limited to:
💡Looking ahead into Social innovation
💡The future of government, policy making and democracy
💡Global challenges that go beyond nation states (such as migration, climate change etc.) and require international collaboration of individual governments
💡Digital transformation in public sector context
💡The future of digital governance
💡Public values in transforming the government
💡The role of government in eCities and sustainable living
💡The role of the public sector in Human Centered Society
💡Self Service Structures for Inclusion
💡Public-private sector collaboration and integration;
💡Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAO), smart contracts and blockchain
💡Preparing for the policy challenges of future technologies;
💡Regulating misinformation
💡New technologies for automated decision-making
💡The future public sector use and regulation of latest AI solutions;
💡Public use as well as regulations of industry 4.0 and the internet of things
💡The relationships of governments and Fintech
💡Upcoming issues of eVoting including application of digital signatures in the public sector
💡Online public community building
💡Utilization of digital billboards
💡Latest trends in co-creation and service delivery
💡Forward looking insights from case studies – let it be successful or failed experiments.
 

🗓️🗓️🗓️ IMPORTANT DATES
Deadline for submissions: 31 March 2023
PhD Colloquium deadline for submissions: 1 May 2023
Poster submission deadline: 20 May 2023
PhD Colloquium: 4 September 2023
Conference: 5-7 September 2023

Do not miss 3 days of discussions around e-Government, Digital Government, Open Government, Smart Government, GovTech, eParticipation and e-Democracy, and related topics like social media, digital transformation, Digital society, artificial intelligence, policy information, policy informatics, smart cities, and social innovation. Mark your calendar – 31 March 2023 for submitting your paper, and 5-7 September 2023 for attending the conference!

The conference is organized by the IFIP 8.5 Working group (WG8.5) and the Digital Government Society (DGS). The aim of WG 8.5 is to improve the quality of e-government information systems at international, national, regional and local levels. The WG8.5 emphasis is on interdisciplinary approaches for information systems in public administration. DGS is a global, multi-disciplinary organization of scholars and practitioners interested in the development and impacts of digital government. Read more here.

AI for Open Data or Open Data for AI? An invited talk for BBDU Development Program «Artificial Intelligence for Sustainable Development»🎤

Anastasija Nikiforova 1 Comment

Recently I was honored to contribute to Babu Banarasi Das University (BBDU, Department of Computer Science and Engineering) Development Program «Artificial Intelligence for Sustainable Development» with the talk entitled “Artificial Intelligence for Open Data or Open Data for Artificial Intelligence?”. More precisely, this series of workshops is organized for the industry, i.e. representatives of industry, who want to get an insight on the current advances in various topic-related areas (AI in the sustainability context) from people representing research and academia, which is organized by AI Research Centre, Department of Computer Science & Engineering, Babu Banarasi Das University (India), ShodhGuru Research Labs, Soft Computing Research Society, IEEE UP Section, Computational Intelligence Society Chapter. My session, for instance, was attended by more than 130 attendees, which I consider to be a very good rate!


Regarding my talk, I was delighted to deliver in the last day of this event, being also a guest of honor for this event, when we speak about “Artificial Intelligence for Open Data or Open Data for Artificial Intelligence?” – in short, not OR but rather AND. In other words, AI for Open Data and Open Data for AI, where open data serves as a valuable asset for AI (of course, if a list of prerequisites is fulfilled), while AI defines new prerequisites for open data we should think of.

At the same time, although their combination is considered to play a transformational role in human society, and especially in prominent areas, as we discussed today, this “magic duo” is not always about “unicorns and ice creams“, where the current state-of-the-art suggests that open data my pose also certain risks.

Probably the most expressive example of such, I referred to, is an example, when based on easily obtainable open data on toxic molecules collected over the years, AI has managed to create 40,000 molecular associations potentially usable as biochemical weapons in just 6 hours. And while not all of them are actually usable, and the need to synthesize them still remains, some associations correspond to known chemical weapons with one even more toxic than the VX nerve gas, identified as a weapon of mass destruction by the United Nations.

AI for open data or open data for AI?Download

So here comes a very interesting dilemma between openness as a philosophy and making data open, and threats it may pose, if used by a malevolent actor.

We also briefly touched a topic of risks associated with AI (although both perspectives of so-called cyber-pessimists and cyber-optimists in this regard were considered), open data, and their combination, along with the long list of benefits they can bring, including their contribution to the sustainability being in line with the general idea of this event.
And, of course, we could not ignore the topic of green AI and a strong need to consider FATE principles (Fairness, Accountability, Transparency & Explainability).

All in all, it was a very nice experience and the audience so curious and passionate of topics elaborated on within this 6-days long event with speakers from both continents Asia, Africa, America and Europe (represented by me! 🤓🤓🤓). Exceptional audience with so relevant questions leading to a lively and fruitful discussion being of interest for both participants and speakers. Glad to be part of it and get this experience!

CertificateDownload

This is just in a few words, although at some point I plan to extend this post with more details and thoughts.