The agent based approach is a well established methodology to model distributed intelligent systems. Multi-Agent Systems (MAS) are increasingly employed in applications dealing with safety and information critical tasks (e.g., in eHealth, financial, and energy domains). Therefore, transparency and the trustworthiness of the agents and their behaviors must be enforced. For example, employing reputation based mechanisms can promote the development of trust. Nevertheless, besides recent early stage studies, the existing methods and systems are still unable to guarantee the desired accountability and transparency adequately. In line with the recent trends, we advocate that combining blockchain technology (BCT) and MAS can achieve the distribution of the trust, removing the need for trusted third parties (TTP), potential single points of failure. This paper elaborates on the notions of trust, BCT, MAS, and their integration. Furthermore, to attain a trusted environment, this manuscript details the design and implementation of a system reconciling MAS (based on the Java Agent DEvelopment Framework (JADE)) and BTC (based on Hyperledger Fabric). In particular, the agents’ interactions, computation, tracking the reputation, and possible policies for disagreement-management are implemented via smart contracts and stored on an immutable distributed ledger. The results obtained by the presented system and similar solutions are also discussed. Finally, ethical implications (i.e., opportunities and challenges) are elaborated before concluding the paper.

Choices and preferences of individuals are nowadays increasingly influenced by countless inputs and recommendations provided by artificial intelligence-based systems. The accuracy of recommender systems (RS) has achieved remarkable results in several domains, from infotainment to marketing and lifestyle. However, in sensitive use-cases, such as nutrition, there is a need for more complex dynamics and responsibilities beyond conventional RS frameworks. On one hand, virtual coaching systems (VCS) are intended to support and educate the users about food, integrating additional dimensions w.r.t. the conventional RS (i.e., leveraging persuasion techniques, argumentation, informative systems, and recommendation paradigms) and show promising results. On the other hand, as of today, VCS raise unexplored ethical and legal concerns. This paper discusses the need for a clear understanding of the ethical/legal-technological entanglements, formalizing 21 ethical and ten legal challenges and the related mitigation strategies. Moreover, it elaborates on nutrition sustainability as a further nutrition virtual coaches dimension for a better society.

Public trust in health information is essential to ensure that preventative strategies to reduce the transmission of COVID-19 are accepted and followed. This study explored the way Swiss people accessed and consumed news and information about the coronavirus from different channels, and the role media plays in public trust during the pandemic. Based on a study of 442 randomly assigned participants in French-speaking regions, we examined the following four questions: (1) What are the news sources and platforms and how are they used? (2) How does the public rate the trustworthiness of these sources and platforms? (3) To what extent does the public perceive that these sources and platforms are provided inaccurate information? (4) What roles do these sources and platforms play in the pandemic? Implications are discussed in the conclusion based on our findings.