Taiwan’s upcoming digital innovation policy would include provisions to establish a Chinese-language database to support the development of sovereign, Taiwan-centric artificial intelligence (AI), the Ministry of Digital Affairs said yesterday.
Deputy Minister of Digital Affairs Lin Yi-jing (林宜敬), in a preview of the policy, said that Taiwanese developers urgently need access to high-quality data to train their algorithms, as well as clear guidance on protecting intellectual property and ensuring data privacy.
The new policy aims to equip ministry officials with the tools needed to release public-sector data to help developers build large language models that reflect Taiwan’s cultural and political perspectives, Lin said.
Photo: CNA
The digital innovation policy is scheduled to take effect after the end of the public preview period in the middle of next month, he said.
The policy would allow the government to expand access to its databases, promote the creation of data-sharing platforms among private entities, and lower the cost of accessing government-held data, Department of Digital Innovation head Chuang Ming-fen (莊明芬) said.
The plan would require national ministries, county governments and special municipalities to appoint dedicated data officers as part of their digital innovation strategies, she said
Asked about the progress of the government’s sovereign AI efforts, Chuang said the ministry is shifting its focus from streamlining data access procedures to curating and refining the quality of content made available to developers.
The industry has a greater need for detailed, text-based content than the statistical compilation and processed information typically provided by the government, she said, adding that the former is better suited for training language models.
Of the 50,000 datasets the government has released in recent years, only about 1,000 contain full-text content, she said.
The ministry is also mulling a guideline for government offices to authorize the release of data for training sovereign AI, Lin said.
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