In Pursuit of Money, at What Risk

As companies race to implement generative AI technology into their solutions, I think it is important to recognize that while there are many benefits with this rapidly evolving technology, it is important to be attentive to the risks. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman testified in front of Congress regarding the risks of generative AI and the need for regulation. Also testifying were two other AI experts, professor of Psychology and Neural Science at New York University Gary Marcus and IBM Chief Privacy & Trust Officer Christina Montgomery. All three support governance of AI at both federal and global levels.

“I think if this technology goes wrong, it can go quite wrong, and we want to be vocal about that,” Altman said, adding, “We want to work with the government to prevent that from happening.”

There are five major risks associated with generative AI, according to experts:

1. Misinformation and Disinformation: Generative AI has the potential to produce highly realistic fake content, including deepfake videos (for example, the deep fake videos of Tom Cruise on TikTok ) and realistic text, which can be exploited for spreading misinformation and disinformation.
2. Privacy and Security Concerns: As generative AI becomes more sophisticated, it poses a threat to personal privacy and data security. Generative AI can be used to generate convincing fake identities, potentially leading to identity theft and other malicious activities.
3. Amplification of Biases: If trained on biased or incomplete datasets, generative AI algorithms can inadvertently amplify existing biases or introduce new biases into the generated content, perpetuating discrimination and unfairness.
4. Ethical Implications: The use of generative AI raises ethical concerns related to consent, accountability, and transparency. The potential misuse of this technology can have severe consequences, and the responsibility lies with developers, organizations, and policymakers to address these ethical considerations.
5. Intellectual Property Infringement: Generative AI can be used to create replicas or imitations of copyrighted works, leading to intellectual property infringement. This can harm creative industries and pose legal challenges in determining ownership and authenticity of generated content.

Interestingly enough, in an?interview with CBS'?60 Minutes , Google tech exec James Manyika admitted that the company's AI had somehow learned a language on which it had not been trained. "We discovered that with very few amounts of prompting in Bengali," Manyika said, "it can now translate all of Bengali." The intriguing and scary thing is developers have no clue how it was able to do this.

I am a geek and love emerging tech, and yes, I have been playing with generative AI tech like ChatGPT and DALLE-E 2, but I agree with Altman that there needs to be regulation with this rapidly evolving technology. Sadly, I am not sure those in Congress are technical enough to understand the technology to regulate it. We shall see. Hopefully, they will lean heavily on the experts to create the appropriate guardrails to enable us to enjoy the benefits with responsibly developed generative AI.