US President Joe Biden issued a far-reaching executive order aiming at ensuring protection against threats posed by artificial intelligence (AI) amid growing concerns about its potential impact on critical entities ranging from national security to public health.
Biden called the order the most “significant” action that any government has taken on the safe deployment of AI.
The executive order requires developers of AI systems that pose a threat to US national security, the economy, public health, or safety to disclose the outcomes of safety tests with the US government, prior to their public release.
The White House said the sharing of test results for powerful models would “ensure AI systems are safe, secure, and trustworthy before companies make them public”.
It also calls on the National Institute of Standards and Technology to establish “rigorous standards” for testing AI prior to its release.
“To realize the promise of AI and avoid the risk, we need to govern this technology,” Biden said.
The order additionally seeks to foster the expansion of AI within the United States by enticing foreign AI experts to American companies, as a tactic to impede the progress of competing nations.
The US president also acknowledged the new regulations are planned to restrict the access of countries like China, to the most potent chips needed to produce large language models on which artificial intelligence systems are based.
White House Deputy Chief of Staff Bruce Reed hailed the measures as “the strongest set of actions any government in the world has ever taken on AI safety, security, and trust” and the “next step in an aggressive strategy to do everything on all fronts to harness the benefits of AI and mitigate the risks”.
However, NetChoice, a national trade association that includes major tech platforms, described the order as an “AI Red Tape Wishlist,” that will end up “stifling new companies and competitors from entering the marketplace and significantly expanding the power of the federal government over American innovation.”
Vice president Kamala Harris emphasized that the US is at the forefront of AI on a global scale, and the order should be viewed as a prototype for worldwide initiatives.
“It is American companies that lead the world in AI innovation,” Harris said at the international AI safety summit in the UK this week. “It is America that can catalyze global action and build global consensus in a way that no other country can. And under President Joe Biden that will continue to lead on AI.”
Depicting the executive order as a “bold action,” Biden emphasized the urgency for Congress to promptly take necessary measures to guarantee the secure implementation and advancement of AI.
Several lawsuits have been filed by well-known American writers and visual artists against tech companies, alleging that their works have been stolen and used to train generative AI systems.
However, tech companies have defended themselves by citing US copyright law, which they claim protects their use of the content.
