President of the United States, Joe Biden has said Artificial Intelligence (AI) poses threats to the security, society and economy.
He spoke on Friday at a parley in Washington DC with leaders of Amazon, Anthropic, Google, Inflection, Meta, Microsoft, and OpenAI, which are the seven American companies driving innovation in AI.
Biden added that AI also offers incredible opportunities.
“Just two months ago, Kamala and I met with these leaders — most of them are here again — to underscore the responsibility of making sure that products that they are producing are safe and — and making them public — what they are and what they aren’t. Since then, I’ve met with some of America’s top minds in technology to hear the range of perspectives and possibilities and risk of AI,” he said.
Biden said his administration has taken action to guide responsible innovation, including the introduction of the first-of-its-kind AI Bill of Rights and an executive order to direct agencies to protect the public from algorithms that discriminate.
He said: “And today, I’m pleased to announce that these seven companies have agreed to voluntary commitments for responsible innovation. These commitments, which the companies will implement immediately, underscore three fundamental principles: safety, security, and trust.
“First, the companies have an obligation to make sure their technology is safe before releasing it to the public. That means testing the capabilities of their systems, assessing their potential risk, and making the results of these assessments public.
“Second, companies must prioritise the security of their systems by safeguarding their models against cyber threats and managing the risks to our national security and sharing the best practices and industry standards that are — that are necessary.
“Third, the companies have a duty to earn the people’s trust and empower users to make informed decisions — labeling content that has been altered or AI-generated, rooting out bias and discrimination, strengthening privacy protections, and shielding children from harm.
“And finally, companies have agreed to find ways for AI to help meet society’s greatest challenges — from cancer to climate change — and invest in education and new jobs to help students and workers prosper from the opportunities, and there are enormous opportunities of AI.”
Americans, he said, are seeing how advanced artificial intelligence and the pace of innovation have the power to disrupt jobs and industries.
He added that in the weeks ahead he would take executive action to help America lead the way towards responsible innovation.
A factsheet released by the White House shows that the seven companies committed themselves to ensuring their products are safe before introducing them to the public, building systems that put security first and earning the public’s trust.
