Assistive technologies for people with disabilities : Part IV: Legal and socio-ethical perspectives

As assistive technologies (ΑΤs) continue to be introduced in many areas of public and private life the need has arisen to assess the aptness of the EU legal framework to cope with the ethical and regulatory challenges they present. The key question is to what extent ATs may affect or reshape the existing norms regarding liability, privacy and autonomy that often feature as the major issues requiring regulatory attention. Technology in itself is neither good nor bad, it is the way it is used that determines its effect. The main challenge is therefore to develop a framework that can cope with potential threats to the privacy, integrity, safety and autonomy of disabled people in an inclusive and dynamic manner. The project concludes with a series of social, ethical and legal reflections on the role of current and future European Parliament initiatives in the context of trends in the AT field. The analysis identifies various legal challenges that ATs raise in the context of EU law, including the coordination of the various competence layers, the lack of a commonly accepted definition, and the variety of risks ATs pose for the human rights, privacy, dignity, access to technology, autonomy and social inclusion of people with disabilities. The analysis illustrates the various ways in which the current EU legislative framework may be affected by technological trends, analysing the legal and socio-ethical challenges that might have to be dealt with, especially in the light of the European Accessibility Act currently under discussion. It also provides a series of overarching recommendations for EU actors to take into account when dealing with ATs. The study also identifies wider concerns, including the changing concept of what constitutes a healthy human body, medical classifications, social stigma and financing the development and provision of ATs. In response, several options for responsive policy action are suggested. These include securing accessibility as a human right, promoting privacy by design, improving the informed consent process, bringing in a user-centred model of technology design, allowing freedom of choice to use ATs, maintaining the availability of human care, developing appropriate ethics oversight structures, introducing a new classification system for ATs and ensuring safety in their use.