Working across the quality and standards infrastructure, the AI Assurance Stakeholder Consortium is tasked with creating a Code of Ethics and a skills and competencies framework, alongside building the credibility and status of AI assurance services.
Why was the AI Assurance Stakeholder Consortium created?
In June this year, Kanishka Narayan MP Minister for AI and Online Safety, announced a new expert consortium to strengthen trust in AI and help the UK seize the economic opportunities of responsible AI adoption.
The AI Assurance Stakeholder Consortium has been convened by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) and is led by BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT. It will bring together leading voices from across the UK’s AI assurance ecosystem to support the development of a recognised AI assurance profession.
The AI Assurance Stakeholder Consortium will be chaired by Emma McGuigan FBCS who said the following: “We will focus on practical steps that help organisations understand what good AI assurance looks like, from professional ethics and skills, to the information needed to assess AI systems properly.”
What is AI assurance?
AI assurance refers to the processes and professional practices used to assess whether an AI system is safe, trustworthy and working as intended throughout its lifecycle. This includes looking at how an AI system is designed, developed and deployed, as well as how it is governed and how risks are identified, managed and monitored over time.
In practice, organisations may seek independent AI assurance to give confidence that their systems meet expected technical, ethical and governance standards.
Why is AI assurance important?
AI assurance helps to reduce risk, prevent harm and build trust in AI systems. As AI is increasingly used in sensitive and high-impact contexts, organisations need confidence that systems are reliable, explainable and properly governed.
What will the AI Assurance Stakeholder Consortium achieve?
The UK already has strong foundations in AI assurance, with a growing market worth an estimated £1.01 billion gross value added (GVA) in 2024. Government analysis suggests the market could grow to £18.8 billion GVA by 2035 if barriers to AI adoption are addressed.
The Consortium will support this growth by developing practical building blocks for a future AI assurance profession, including:
WS1: Skills and Competencies Define the skills, knowledge and competencies required to practise AI assurance effectively. Consider existing adjacent frameworks (cybersecurity, data science, internal audit) and pathways into the profession.
Year One deliverable: Skills and competencies framework for AI assurance professionals
WS2: Code of Ethics and Registration Develop a voluntary, government-backed code of ethics and professional conduct for AI assurance practitioners. Embed standards for behaviour, independence and accountability. Consideration should be given to how adherence to the Code of Ethics is demonstrated in practice — a professional register is a likely mechanism for this.
Year One deliverable: Voluntary Code of Ethics and the process for the registration Conduct and the associated recognition process.
WS3: Information Access Map the information access requirements for different types of AI assurance activity. Identify barriers to access and inform development of best practice guidelines for firms commissioning assurance.
Year One deliverable: Requirements on information access
WS4: Data Standards and International Interoperability Examine the data standards that underpin effective AI assurance and consider how the UK's approach aligns with international frameworks, including those of the EU and US. Draw on BCS's international standards work including SFIA and IEEE.
Year One deliverable: Recommendations on data standards adoption and international interoperability of the skills and competency framework and professional standards.
WS5: Building the Profession Consider approach to adoption and scaling of the profession both in the UK and internationally to unlock economic value and increase public trust in AI solutions. Take a longer-term view: what will it mean to be an AI assurance professional in five years? What is the growth opportunity? Explore questions of certification vs registration, internal vs third-party assurance, and the pathway to a formally recognised profession.
Year One deliverable: Recommendations on the adoption of the AI assurance Consortium outputs and the growth of the industry in UK and beyond; alignment of growth enablers alongside vision paper and recommendations for future professionalisation
Who are the founding AI Assurance Stakeholder Consortium members?
- BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT - Chair, Emma McGuigan FBCS; Vice-chair Sharon Gunn MBCS, BFP, FCA; Group Chief Executive, BCS
- UK Accreditation Service (UKAS)
- British Standards Institute (BSI)
- National Physical Laboratory (NPL)
- Ada Lovelace Institute
- Chartered Quality Institute (CQI)
- Adam Leon Smith FBCS - independent expert
- Professor Dame Wendy Hall, DBE, FRS, FREng, DistFBCS, Regius Professor of Computer Science, University of Southampton – independent expert
In addition to the Core consortium members there are a range of Observers and an Industry Advisory Group, lead by techUK.
Where can I find out more about the AI Assurance Stakeholder Consortium?
If you have a question for the AI Assurance Stakeholder Consortium please contact AIAssurance@bcs.uk; please note that questions for DSIT should be directed via gov.uk.
FAQs
How does AI assurance support trustworthy AI systems?
AI assurance gives organisations and the wider public confidence that AI systems work as intended, are safe and can be trusted. Just as a financial auditor independently verifies a company's accounts, AI assurance professionals independently test and evaluate AI systems against agreed standards, identifying risks and verifying that systems behave reliably and ethically.
As AI becomes more embedded in business, public services and everyday life, assurance is what makes it possible to adopt AI confidently and enables innovation to scale. A thriving AI assurance market supports faster, safer AI adoption, drives economic growth and helps position the UK as a world leader in responsible AI.
Who is responsible for AI assurance within organisations?
There is currently no single regulatory requirement that determines who within an organisation is responsible for AI assurance, and practice varies. In many organisations, responsibility sits across a combination of teams, including risk, technology, legal, compliance and audit, depending on the organisation's size, sector and appetite for AI governance.
As the field matures, we expect to see more organisations designating specific roles for AI risk and assurance, whether through an internal AI risk or audit function or through commissioning independent third-party assurance or a combination of both. The AI Assurance Consortium is working to develop the professional standards and frameworks that will help organisations understand what good looks like and make informed decisions about how to resource it.
What role do professional bodies play in AI assurance?
Professional bodies are essential to building a trusted, high-quality AI assurance market. They set and maintain the standards that define what it means to be a competent, ethical practitioner. They develop the certifications and registrations that give employers and clients confidence in the people they are working with. And they provide the ongoing learning and development that keeps professionals up to date, which is particularly important in a fast-moving field like AI.
In a sector as new and rapidly evolving as AI assurance, professional bodies also play a convening role by bringing together experts from across industry, government, academia and civil society to agree on the skills, competencies and ethical frameworks the profession needs. Unlike many fields AI assurance is important across multiple professions and this convening of professional bodies is critical to allow a high-quality AI assurance market to evolve.
How is the UK approaching AI assurance and governance?
The UK already has a significant and growing AI assurance market, estimated in 2024 to be worth over £1 billion and employing around 12,500 people. The UK's approach to AI governance has to date been largely sector-based, with regulators in individual sectors, such as financial services, taking responsibility for how AI is used in their domains.
Building on these foundations, the government's Roadmap to Trusted Third-Party AI Assurance sets out an ambition to grow and professionalise the UK's AI assurance market. This includes supporting the development of third-party AI assurance: where independent professionals externally verify that AI systems work as intended, as well as internal assurance functions within organisations. The AI Assurance Consortium is a central part of this agenda, tasked with developing the professional infrastructure that will underpin a world-leading AI assurance sector.
