The Limits of AI Data Transparency Policy: Three Disclosure Fallacies

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Shen, Judy Hanwen, Liu, Ken, Wang, Angelina, Cen, Sarah H., Zhang, Andy K., Meinhardt, Caroline, Zhang, Daniel, Klyman, Kevin, Bommasani, Rishi, Ho, Daniel E.
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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author Shen, Judy Hanwen
Liu, Ken
Wang, Angelina
Cen, Sarah H.
Zhang, Andy K.
Meinhardt, Caroline
Zhang, Daniel
Klyman, Kevin
Bommasani, Rishi
Ho, Daniel E.
author_facet Shen, Judy Hanwen
Liu, Ken
Wang, Angelina
Cen, Sarah H.
Zhang, Andy K.
Meinhardt, Caroline
Zhang, Daniel
Klyman, Kevin
Bommasani, Rishi
Ho, Daniel E.
contents Data transparency has emerged as a rallying cry for addressing concerns about AI: data quality, privacy, and copyright chief among them. Yet while these calls are crucial for accountability, current transparency policies often fall short of their intended aims. Similar to nutrition facts for food, policies aimed at nutrition facts for AI currently suffer from a limited consideration of research on effective disclosures. We offer an institutional perspective and identify three common fallacies in policy implementations of data disclosures for AI. First, many data transparency proposals exhibit a specification gap between the stated goals of data transparency and the actual disclosures necessary to achieve such goals. Second, reform attempts exhibit an enforcement gap between required disclosures on paper and enforcement to ensure compliance in fact. Third, policy proposals manifest an impact gap between disclosed information and meaningful changes in developer practices and public understanding. Informed by the social science on transparency, our analysis identifies affirmative paths for transparency that are effective rather than merely symbolic.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2601_18127
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle The Limits of AI Data Transparency Policy: Three Disclosure Fallacies
Shen, Judy Hanwen
Liu, Ken
Wang, Angelina
Cen, Sarah H.
Zhang, Andy K.
Meinhardt, Caroline
Zhang, Daniel
Klyman, Kevin
Bommasani, Rishi
Ho, Daniel E.
Computers and Society
Artificial Intelligence
Data transparency has emerged as a rallying cry for addressing concerns about AI: data quality, privacy, and copyright chief among them. Yet while these calls are crucial for accountability, current transparency policies often fall short of their intended aims. Similar to nutrition facts for food, policies aimed at nutrition facts for AI currently suffer from a limited consideration of research on effective disclosures. We offer an institutional perspective and identify three common fallacies in policy implementations of data disclosures for AI. First, many data transparency proposals exhibit a specification gap between the stated goals of data transparency and the actual disclosures necessary to achieve such goals. Second, reform attempts exhibit an enforcement gap between required disclosures on paper and enforcement to ensure compliance in fact. Third, policy proposals manifest an impact gap between disclosed information and meaningful changes in developer practices and public understanding. Informed by the social science on transparency, our analysis identifies affirmative paths for transparency that are effective rather than merely symbolic.
title The Limits of AI Data Transparency Policy: Three Disclosure Fallacies
topic Computers and Society
Artificial Intelligence
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.18127