'If This Technology Goes Wrong, It Can Go Quite Wrong': OpenAI CEO Sam Altman Urges US Lawmakers To Prioritise AI Regulation

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman emphasised the importance of regulating AI to US lawmakers on Tuesday.

Lawmakers expressed their concern over AI development, with a senator using a computer-generated voice, almost identical to his own, to read a text composed by a bot at a hearing on Capitol Hill.

Senator Richard Blumenthal stated that although the voice and words may have sounded like his own to those listening from home, it was not actually him speaking.

According to Blumenthal, AI technology is 'more than just research experiments', no longer fantasies of science fiction but a real and current phenomenon.

"If this technology goes wrong, it can go quite wrong," Altman said, reports AFP.

Altman took the opportunity to advocate new regulations for big tech, during the session.

Governments globally face urgency to act as ChatGPT bot's widespread popularity and ability to generate human-like content rapidly has impressed and unnerved users.

Altman has emerged as the prominent figure in the realm of artificial intelligence, actively promoting his company's technology to various entities such as Microsoft and numerous other corporations and also cautions about the potential malevolent impacts of AI on society.

"OpenAI was founded on the belief that artificial intelligence has the potential to improve nearly every aspect of our lives, but also that it creates serious risks," Altman said.

OpenAI's generative AI will eventually tackle significant issues such as cancer treatments and climage change, he added.

However, governments need to regulate powerful models to minimize risks of disinformation, job insecurity and other hazards, he explained.

Altman proposed a licensing and testing system for releasing strong AI models, with the ability to withdraw permits if regulations are not followed, to the US government.

He suggested labeling, global coordination for rule-setting, and a dedicated US agency for handling artificial intelligence.

"I think the US should lead here and do things first, but to be effective we do need something global," he suggested.

US lawmakers emphasised their intention to classify generative AI systems li, including ChatGPT and DALL-E, as requiring special transparency measures that alert users to the fact that the output was created by a machine.

DALL-E by OpenAI enabled easy generation of graphics and Van Gogh-like lookalikes online with a few clicks since its launch last year.