Critical Vulnerabilities of AI in Latin America

Abstract

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is rapidly reshaping societies, economies, and governance systems worldwide. While it offers tools for addressing critical challenges—such as climate change, health care, and educational inequity—it also risks deepening historical inequalities, undermining democratic institutions, and exacerbating global technological dependencies if not ethically governed. Latin America faces unique vulnerabilities for the development and use of AI, currently underexplored in existing scholarship—such as informal data work or the territorial principle and its implications on AI law enforcement—this study investigates AI's critical vulnerabilities within the Latin American context in order to determine and provide regional and national policies to advance on an inclusive, strategic, and ethical approach for developing and deploying AI systems in Latin America. The study seeks to answer the question through a cross-analysis and comparative case study of six countries (Brazil, Chile, México Costa Rica, El Salvador and Honduras) drawing on existing and recent global and regional benchmarks, including the Stanford HAI AI Index (2024), UNESCO’s Recommendation on the Ethics of AI (2021), and the Latin American AI Index (ILIA 2024). The countries were selected based on a broad range of AI readiness levels, focusing on mapping institutional, regulatory, and socio-political contexts as well as metrics and input from relevant sources. The analysis shows structural inequality as the core vulnerability shaping AI’s impact in Latin America, alongside governance gaps, limited regional cooperation, and minimal public participation. The analysis identifies ten critical vulnerabilities—including the use of AI in surveillance, increase in inequality, increase in disinformation, AI-use in organized crime, and environmental exploitation—that, if unaddressed, may accelerate democratic erosion and technological dependency. Ethical principles are shown to be deeply interconnected and grounded in human rights, yet their implementation remains aspirational. This research underscores a call for action toward regional coordination, inclusive education strategies prioritizing gender policies and rural areas, and aligned industrial policies in the countries of the region. A Latin American context-specific, collective approach ensures that AI serves the public interest, strengthens sovereignty, and supports equitable development in Latin America.