The European Union’s Artificial Intelligence Act (Regulation (EU) 2024/1689), which came into force on August 1, 2024, and will be fully enforceable by August 2, 2026, marks a significant milestone as the world’s first comprehensive horizontal legal framework for AI regulation. This pioneering legislation addresses the critical balance between mitigating AI-related risks and promoting opportunities for innovation, establishing a robust regulatory foundation that impacts various sectors, including law enforcement and correctional agencies.
For correctional systems, the EU AI Act introduces essential compliance requirements and ethical guidelines to ensure that AI tools used in decision-making processes remain transparent, fair, and unbiased. The Act underscores the need for human oversight, particularly in contexts where AI influences decisions that affect individual rights and freedoms, such as offender management, rehabilitation, and recidivism prediction.
In alignment with the EU AI Act, the research and development behind the HORUS 360 iOMS Intelligent Offender Management System and the next-generation HORUS 360 iOMS NextGen has been meticulously guided by the regulatory principles of safety, transparency, and accountability.
This presentation explores how the AI Act influences the design and deployment of intelligent systems within correctional environments, highlighting the transformative potential of AI when governed by a balanced and forward-thinking regulatory approach.
×
Pedro das Neves
Board Member, ICPA, Canada
Pedro is the CEO of IPS_Innovative Prison Systems and founder and editor of the JUSTICE TRENDS Magazine. Holding a Sociology degree from UBI and a MA in public policy from the College of Europe in Bruges, throughout his career, he pursued education in Leadership Development, Public Administration Reform and Public Policy, but also in Organizational Design, Digital Transformation, and Artificial Intelligence and Data Science (Univ. of Virginia, the MIT, and the Univ. of Chicago). With more than 2 decades working in Criminal Justice Innovation, he coordinated and worked in 75 projects involving 51 countries, many focusing the development of digital strategies or the use of digital technologies in corrections, having several publications and numerous participations as speaker in international events. Since 2020, Pedro leads the multidisciplinary R&D team that developed the HORUS 360 iOMS Intelligent Offender/Jail Management System.
He is board member of the “BSAFE Research LAB”, board director of the “ICPA International Corrections and Prisons Association”, VP of “Health through Walls”, Inc., board advisor of the “Connecting Hearts Foundation for the Children of Inmates”, founder and ambassador of the “All4Integrity against corruption NGO”, and founder and chair of the board of “EaSI, the European Association for Social Innovation”, among other participations in several non-governmental organisations. He is member of the European Commission expert group on the EU Judicial Training, and of the expert group on the implementation of the European Arrest Warrant. Recently was invited by the UNICRI to join the expert working Group on Technologies for Prisoner Rehabilitation. He participated in multiple initiatives as senior consultant for the UNODC in Vienna, Central Asia, and the Middle East. In LATAM works with the InterAmerican Development Bank (BID) in citizen security projects in more than 10 countries. In 2017 he was awarded the ICPA Correctional Excellence Award.
