White House Action to Rein In AI a Good First Step, But More Is Needed

The White House today will host the CEOs of Microsoft, Google, Anthropic and OpenAI, to promote the administration’s plan to promote responsible AI development. In response to today’s summit, Robert Weissman, president of Public Citizen, issued the following statement:

“Today’s announcement from the White House is a useful step forward, but much more is needed to address the threats of runaway corporate AI.

“Substantive commitments today from the Biden administration further its vital effort to work proactively to ensure that the federal government’s use of AI advances public objectives without discriminating against people of color, undermining privacy or infringing on Americans’ rights.

“The administration is rightly prioritizing this issue, using tools in its toolkit, and working to leverage its powerful Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights by securing commitments from AI companies to evaluate publicly whether and how they are complying with the Bill of Rights’ principles.

“But we also need more aggressive measures, including legislation to make the AI Bill of Rights’ principles enforceable.

“At this point, Big Tech companies need to be saved from themselves. The companies and their top AI developers are well aware of the risks posed by generative AI. But they are in a competitive arms race and each believes themselves unable to slow down. It makes no sense for We the People to just sit by and watch this dangerous competition and just hope things work out.

“President Biden should call for, and Congress should legislate, a moratorium on the deployment of new generative AI technologies, to remain in effect until there is a robust regulatory framework in place to address generative AI’s enormous risks.”