Before a meeting between Vice President Kamala Harris and the heads of the US companies Google, Microsoft, OpenAI and Anthropic on Thursday in Washington, the White House announced guidelines for dealing with AI technologies. “Tech companies have a fundamental responsibility to ensure that their products are safe and secure and that they guarantee people’s rights before they are deployed or released,” said government technology commissioner Arati Prabhakar.
The aim of the guidelines, which are to be developed together with the AI forges by the summer, is to protect the American people and civil rights from potential dangers posed by AI while at the same time exploiting the advantages of the powerful technology. This basis for regulation must also be created with regard to significantly more powerful programs in the future. Cooperation with the European Union, among others, which had recently taken similar steps, was also important for the possible establishment of global standards.
Text Automat ChatGPT and Software Bard cause a stir
According to experts, sensational advances can be achieved in the future with the help of machine learning, for example in science – for example in medicine – and traffic safety. At the same time, there are several voices warning of the potential for significant damage.
The text machine ChatGPT, Google’s competitor software Bard and programs that can generate images based on text descriptions are currently causing a stir. It is feared that their skills could be used to produce and disseminate false information or for other harmful purposes.
Government Commissioner Prabhakar named several specific risks – for example in cyber security and the protection of fundamental rights, for example through real-time monitoring of people. Whole democracies could be undermined with the help of AI and human workers could be replaced by machines in large parts of the economy.
