Incident Response for AI Systems: Handling AI Failures

AI systems require specialized incident response procedures. Here’s how to handle AI failures effectively.

AI Incident Response Framework

from dataclasses import dataclass
from enum import Enum
from typing import List, Dict, Optional
from datetime import datetime

class IncidentSeverity(Enum):
    SEV1 = "critical"  # System down, data corruption
    SEV2 = "high"      # Major feature unavailable
    SEV3 = "medium"    # Degraded performance
    SEV4 = "low"       # Minor issues

class IncidentType(Enum):
    HALLUCINATION = "hallucination"
    TOXICITY = "toxicity"
    DATA_LEAK = "data_leak"
    PERFORMANCE = "performance"
    AVAILABILITY = "availability"
    BIAS = "bias"

@dataclass
class AIIncident:
    id: str
    type: IncidentType
    severity: IncidentSeverity
    description: str
    affected_systems: List[str]
    detected_at: datetime
    mitigated_at: Optional[datetime] = None
    resolved_at: Optional[datetime] = None

class AIIncidentResponse:
    def __init__(self):
        self.incidents = {}
        self.playbooks = self.load_playbooks()

    async def detect_incident(self, alert: Dict) -> Optional[AIIncident]:
        """Detect and classify AI incident from alert."""
        incident_type = self.classify_incident(alert)

        if not incident_type:
            return None

        severity = self.assess_severity(alert, incident_type)

        incident = AIIncident(
            id=self.generate_id(),
            type=incident_type,
            severity=severity,
            description=alert.get("description"),
            affected_systems=alert.get("systems", []),
            detected_at=datetime.now()
        )

        self.incidents[incident.id] = incident
        await self.trigger_response(incident)

        return incident

    async def trigger_response(self, incident: AIIncident):
        """Execute incident response playbook."""
        playbook = self.playbooks.get(incident.type)

        if not playbook:
            await self.generic_response(incident)
            return

        # Execute playbook steps
        for step in playbook.steps:
            try:
                await step.execute(incident)
            except Exception as e:
                await self.log_error(incident, step, e)

    def load_playbooks(self) -> Dict:
        """Load incident response playbooks."""
        return {
            IncidentType.HALLUCINATION: Playbook([
                Step("disable_endpoint", self.disable_endpoint),
                Step("notify_team", self.notify_team),
                Step("collect_evidence", self.collect_hallucination_evidence),
                Step("rollback_model", self.rollback_to_previous),
                Step("verify_fix", self.verify_endpoint)
            ]),
            IncidentType.TOXICITY: Playbook([
                Step("block_output", self.block_toxic_output),
                Step("notify_team", self.notify_team),
                Step("review_guardrails", self.review_guardrails),
                Step("update_filters", self.update_content_filters)
            ]),
            IncidentType.DATA_LEAK: Playbook([
                Step("disable_immediately", self.disable_endpoint),
                Step("notify_security", self.notify_security_team),
                Step("preserve_evidence", self.preserve_logs),
                Step("assess_impact", self.assess_data_impact),
                Step("notify_affected", self.notify_affected_users)
            ])
        }

    async def rollback_to_previous(self, incident: AIIncident):
        """Rollback to previous known-good version."""
        for system in incident.affected_systems:
            previous = await self.get_previous_version(system)
            await self.deploy_version(system, previous)

Effective incident response minimizes AI system impact and enables quick recovery.