Standards are often invisible to the people who rely on them, yet they underpin the confidence that products will work together, operate safely and perform as expected. But rapid technological change resulting from digitalization and the widespread use of AI is challenging traditional ways of assessing conformity to standards.

“Standardization and confirmity assessment (CA) bring tremendous value by providing trust in new technology,” says Wolfram Zeitz, executive secretary of two of the IEC CA systems, IECEE, which is the IEC System of Conformity Assessment Schemes for Electrotechnical Equipment and Components, and IECRE, which is the IEC System for Certification to Standards Relating to Equipment for Use in Renewable Energy Applications.

“What has changed is the speed of development. In the past, product cycles took up to three years before prototypes appeared,” he adds. “Now change happens far, far quicker and this creates a feeling of uncertainty. Consumers lose trust when they think development was rushed and conformity is not being adhered to.”

Henrike Gördes, head of governance at DKE, the organization hosting this year’s IEC general meeting, agrees: “A product that conforms to relevant standards provides assurance that it will behave in predictable ways and interact appropriately within a wider technological ecosystem. This ability to create trust has been one of the foundations of the success of standardization over many years. But maintaining that trust is becoming more challenging as technology changes at an accelerating pace.”

The potential undermining of a standards-based order is particularly acute when software, data or AI can alter a product’s behavior.

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