As AI becomes an increasingly powerful tool in the preservation, digital archiving, and representation of cultural knowledge, there have been important ethical questions to consider about who owns the knowledge, how the knowledge is used, and how it should be interpreted. The use of AI-driven tools, like machine learning, automated translation, generative image creation and digital curation, is being adopted to safeguard intangible cultural heritage like oral traditions, ritual performances, folk narratives and indigenous knowledge systems. These technologies open up new possibilities of accessibility and preservation, but also question issues of authenticity, representation, consent, data collection and cultural agency.

This chapter explores the ethical questions of the preservation of heritage in today's digital culture from an AI perspective. It posits that AI systems are not merely technological devices, but rather socio-political entities that are influenced by platform economies, algorithmic governance, and power imbalances. Cultural practices are being digitized and as such can become commercially usable, and disembodied from local meanings and community ownership. The study is based on the ideas of Walter Benjamin (1969), on the concept of representation of Stuart Hall (1997) and on the UNESCO Recommendation on the safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage (2003). It also draws on current research in the field of AI ethics to explore topics like algorithmic bias, cultural appropriation, surveillance, and data colonialism (Benjamin, 2019; Noble, 2018). This chapter calls for ethical, participatory and human-centred perspectives on the use of AI for the preservation of heritage...