I don't where you live. But almost all of bigtech US cloud is problematic (Read: Illegal to use) for storing or processing of Personal information according to the GDPR if you're based in the EU. Don't know about HIPPA and other non-EU legislation. But almost all cloudservices use US bigtech as a subprocessor under the hood. Which means that the use of AI and cloud is most likely not GDPR-complaint. Which you could mention to the right people and hope they listen.

Edit: It's illegal to use for the processing of the patients PII, because of transfer to insecure third countries and because bigtech uses the data for their own purposes without any legal basis.

Edit 2: The same is the case with your, and your colleagues PII.

In my opinion privacy and GDPR is the same in this case. I think most public authorities is required to have a DPO, fx hospitals or the relevant health authority. The DPO can help answer your and your bosses questions on the mentioned questions.

Hope you figure it out.

Do your patients know that their information is being transcribed in the cloud, which means it could potentially be hacked, leaked, tracked, and sold? How does this foster a sense of distrust, and harm the patients progress?

Could you leverage this information and the possibility of being sued if information is leaked with the bureaucrats?

Dunno, maybe collect the news of every private digital data leak in recent years and show how unsafe it really is?

You're going to lose this fight. Admin types don't understand technology and, at this point, I imagine neither do most doctors. You'll be a loud minority because your concerns aren't concrete enough and 'AI is so cool. I mean it's in the news!'

Maybe I'm wrong, but my organization just went full 'we don't understand AI so don't use it ever,' which is the other side of the same coin.

Shouldn't that be a HIPAA violation? Like you can't in good conscious guarantee that the patient data isn't being used for anything but the healthcare.

It would be worth finding out more about how exactly the training process works, namely whether or not the AI company stores the training audio clips after training has been completed. If not, then I would say you don't have anything to worry about, because the model itself can't be used to clone your voice to any useful extent. Deep neural networks aren't reversible like that. Even if they were, it's not just trained on you, it's trained on hundreds of thousands of people then fine-tuned to you.

If they do store the clips though, then maybe show them this article about GitHub to prove to them that there is precedence for private companies using people's data to train AI without their explicit consent.

I would have work sign a legal discharge that from the moment I use the technology, none of the recordings or transcription of me can be used to incriminate me in case of an alleged malpractice.

In fact, since both are generated or can be generated in a way that both sounds very assertive but also can be adding incredibly wild mistakes, in a potentially life and death situation, they legally recognise potentially nullifying my work, and taking the entire legal responsibility for it.

As you can see in the most recent example involving Air Canada, a policy has been invented out of thin air. Such policy is costing the company. In the case of a doctor, if the administration of the wrong sedative, the wrong medication, or if the wrong diagnosis was communicated to the patient, etc; all that could have serious consequences.

All sounding (using your phrasings, etc) like you, being extremely assertive, etc.

A human doing that job will know not to derive from the recording. An AI? "antihistaminic" and "anti asthmatic" aren't too far off, and that is just one example off of the top of my head.

Will they allow you to use your own non-cloud solution? As long as you turn in text documents and they don't have to pay a person to transcribe, they should be happy. There are a number of speech to text apps you can run locally on a laptop, phone, or tablet.

But of course, it's sometimes about control and exercising their corporate authority over you. Bosses get off on that shit.

Not sure which type of doctor you are, but there's a general shortage of NPI people. I hope you can fight back with some leverage. Best of luck.

Your voice-print is worth protecting.

There's already retirement funds activating "my voice is my password" by default, now. (You can, and absolutely should opt-out, if yours does.) And you can't change your voice-print if it gets leaked. (Maybe with a professional voice coach, you could...)

Personally, I would change employers over this, if I had the option.

I think we're heading towards having a group of citizens with compromised voice-prints leaked to the dark web, who have a harder time day to day through no fault of their own. Like the early SSN breach sufferers, history tells us that society says "it's a shame", and tries to protect the next generation properly, but doesn't recompense those hurt by the early bullshit.

While job searching, I would also request an accomodation, and not use the voice system. It's much easier for the employer to retain a secretary for you, than to deal with the legal hassles that will come up if they try to fire you for not using their legal-gray-area solution.

Even granted the accommodation, I would be looking for my next job though.

Stop using the digital voice recorder and type everything yourself. This is the best way to protect your voice print in this situation. It doesn't work well as a protest or to educate your colleagues, but I suppose that's one thing you can use your voice for. Since AI transcription is a cost saving measure, there will be nothing you can do to stop its use. No decision maker will choose the more expensive option with a higher error rate on morals alone.

I would suggest that that first action item would be is to ask for (in writing) are 1) data protection and 2) privacy policies. I would then either pick it apart, or find someone who works in cybersecurity (or the right lawyer) to do that. I’ve done it a few times and talked my employer out of a few dodgy products, because the policies clearly try to absolve the vendor of any potential liability. Now, whether the policies truly limit liability would have to be tested in court.

You could also talk about how data protection, encryption, identity and access management, and governance is actually really expensive, but I’d first start poking holes in the actual policies to create doubt.

Okay, so two questions:

1. are you in a country that falls under the GDPR?
2. this training data is to be per person?

The personalized data model will be trained on your voice. That means that it's going to be trained on a great deal of patient medical history data (including PII). That means it's covered by HIPAA.

I strongly doubt the service in question meets even the most minimal of requirements.

I assume you'll be using Dragon Medical One. Nuance is a well established organization, with users in a broad range of professions, and their medical product is extensively used by many specialists. The health system where I live has been in the process of phasing out transcriptionists in favor of it for a decade or so.

The only potential privacy concerns a hospital would care about would be if they are storing your transcripts on their servers, because that will contain sensitive information about patients. It will be impossible to get any administrator to care about your voice data.

This tide is unlikely one you will be able to stem, but you could stop dictating and type it yourself.

Ironically, GPT can kinda get you started here...

To present your case effectively to your bosses and colleagues, focus on simplifying the technical aspects and emphasizing the potential risks associated with using a cloud-based AI transcription service:

1. Privacy Concerns: Explain that using a cloud-based solution means entrusting sensitive biometric data (your voice) to a third-party provider. Emphasize that this data could potentially be accessed or misused without your consent.

2. Security Risks: Highlight the risks of data breaches and unauthorized access to your voice recordings stored in the cloud. Mention recent high-profile cases of data breaches to illustrate the potential consequences.

3. Voice Cloning: Explain the concept of voice cloning and how AI algorithms can be trained to mimic your voice using the data stored in the cloud. Use simple examples or analogies to illustrate how this could be used for malicious purposes, such as impersonation or fraud.

4. Lack of Control: Stress that you have no control over how your voice data is used or stored once it's uploaded to the cloud. Unlike a local solution where you have more oversight and control, a cloud-based service leaves you vulnerable to the policies and practices of the provider.

5. Legal and Ethical Implications: While you acknowledge that there may be existing recordings of your voice online, emphasize that knowingly contributing to the creation of a database that could potentially be used for unethical or illegal purposes raises serious concerns about professional ethics and personal privacy.

6. Alternative Solutions: Suggest alternative solutions that prioritize privacy and security, such as using local AI transcription software that does not upload data to the cloud or implementing stricter data protection policies within your organization.

By framing your concerns in terms of privacy, security, and ethical considerations, you can help your bosses and colleagues understand the potential risks associated with using a cloud-based AI transcription service without coming across as paranoid. Highlighting the importance of protecting sensitive data and maintaining control over personal information should resonate with individuals regardless of their level of technical expertise.

So what's your concern? I'm a bit confused.

1. Using cloud to process patient data? Or,
2. Collecting your voice to train a model?

Simple jobs are going to continue to go away in favor of more efficient spending.

You’re not going to get around the removal of simple jobs from the market in favor of newer concepts and more complex operations.

All these people that said going to college to further your education was stupid and a waste of money are going to be the first to bitch and moan because the rest of us who spent the time and money to better ourselves would like to reciprocate that same logic into the world so you don’t have to worry about things like underpaid fast food workers spitting in your food, delivery drivers stealing your food, etc.

Some people who can only do “simple” tasks are the ones who stand the most to be hurt by the world moving forward and becoming more advanced and complex, but I’m not sure what we can do to help them outside of seriously considering UBI. The wealth we are generating and saving through automation deserves to be equally spread amongst the people it replaced. That’s fair.

Personally I'd be more worried about leaking patient information to an uncontrolled system than having a voice model made

You tell them they either have a local person transcribe or you will have no choice but to step down. Tell them that the cloud is no place for medical data. It would also be a bonus if you could a bunch of your coworkers on board.

I had another idea. You might be able to use something that distorts your voice so that it doesn't sound anything like you, but the AI can still transcribe it to text. There are some cheap novelty devices on amazon that do this, and also some more expensive pro audio gear that does the same thing. Just a thought.