Cyber criminals will have new opportunities for intrusion as a result of artificial intelligence, an AI expert told a panel during an Association of Bermuda International Companies presentation.

The panel heard how the emerging technology holds a world of possibilities, including answers to complex questions, laborious tasks sorted more quickly, but also creates favourable circumstances for tech troublemakers.

“I worry about bad people getting ahold of the new technology,” John Hele, chairman of Resolution Re Limited, told 60 people at O'Hara House in Hamilton.

The founder of start-up, Portage AI, which helps companies implement AI, said: “With every new technology, people get to hold these things and apply them in ways that are very powerful.”

He was participating on an AI panel at Axa XL’s headquarters on Bermudiana Road on Wednesday.

Mr Hele said the answer to the threats from artificial intelligence is AI itself. “You have to have AI to fight AI,” he said.

He was not worried about the possibility of AI wiping out humanity.

“There are good people creating techniques to fight the bad actors,” he said. “There could be a whole business developing to protect us against threats to AI.”

Panellist, Aaron Smith, president and chief executive officer of the Igility Group, is an optimist.

“Ultimately, we will leverage this technology for the good of humanity,” he said. “However, we do have to be careful and thoughtful about how we do it.”

He frequently does training and workshops about AI.

Speaker Leire Hernandez, head of application development at the CCS Group, dismissed concerns that AI would replace everyone’s jobs.

“I do not like the word ‘replace’,” she said. “AI is going to make us better in what we are doing.”

Instead of losing jobs, she believed we would see 97 million more jobs created thanks to AI.

However, she was uncertain about which arenas these new jobs will be in. “We are still in the revolution,” she said. “Our mind is still not prepared to know.”

She said prompt engineering was one possible new career path.

“The way we do training will be different, right?” she said. “There will be jobs around privacy, security and compliance.”

In the last five years, there has been a push to put computer coding into primary and high schools to fill an anticipated wave of coding and programming jobs on the horizon.

Now AI could be cancelling, or at least modifying, the coding revolution.

“There will not be a requirement for that many coders,” Mr Smith said.

However, he said coding still has relevance in the school system because it teaches critical thinking and logic.

He said the school system needs to maintain a focus on critical thinking, and not be so focused on the particular way that is done.

Mr Hele said programming teaches you logic.

“If I have a more powerful tool that does not require code, I still need logic to understand the best way to manipulate data,” he said. “So, I think coding skills will benefit these kids for the rest of their lives.”

However, out of the five panellists only one still used coding in their jobs.

“Six years ago, I used code every day,” Ms Hernandez said. “Today, I use it every now and again. I am using it less and less, but it helps to know how to create an application from scratch.”