A new RAND Corporation paper finds that artificial intelligence has the potential to upend the foundations of nuclear deterrence by the year 2040. While AI-controlled doomsday machines are considered unlikely, the hazards of artificial intelligence for nuclear security lie instead in its potential to encourage humans to take potentially apocalyptic risks, according to the paper. During the Cold War, the condition of mutual assured destruction maintained an uneasy peace between the superpowers by ensuring that any attack would be met by a devastating retaliation. Mutual assured destruction thereby encouraged strategic stability by reducing the incentives for either country to take actions that might escalate into a nuclear war. The new RAND publication says that in coming decades, artificial intelligence has the potential to erode the condition of mutual assured destruction and undermine strategic stability.

While AI-controlled doomsday machines are considered unlikely, the hazards of artificial intelligence for nuclear security lie instead in its potential to encourage humans to take potentially apocalyptic risks, according to the paper. During the Cold War, the condition of mutual assured destruction maintained an uneasy peace between the superpowers by ensuring that any attack would be met by a devastating retaliation. Mutual assured destruction thereby encouraged strategic stability by reducing the incentives for either country to take actions that might escalate into a nuclear war. The new RAND publication says that in coming decades, artificial intelligence has the potential to erode the condition of mutual assured destruction and undermine strategic stability. Improved sensor technologies could introduce the possibility that retaliatory forces such as submarine and mobile missiles could be targeted and destroyed.

The common conception of a technologically enabled apocalypse foresees a powerful artificial intelligence that, either deliberately or by accident, destroys human civilization. But as a new report from the RAND Corporation points out, the reality may be far subtler: As AI slowly erodes the foundations that made the Cold War possible, we may find ourselves hurtling towards all-out nuclear war. There's a "significant potential" for artificial intelligence to undermine the foundations of nuclear security, according to a new report published today by the RAND Corporation, a nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization. This grim conclusion was the product of a RAND workshop involving experts in AI, nuclear security, government, and military. The point of the workshop, which is part of RAND's Security 2040 project, was to evaluate the coming impacts of AI and advanced computing on nuclear security over the course of the next two decades.

Lt. Col. Stanislav Petrov settled into the commander's chair in a secret bunker outside Moscow. His job that night was simple: Monitor the computers that were sifting through data from satellites and radar, watching the United States for any sign of a missile launch. It was just after midnight, Sept. 26, 1983. A single word flashed on the screen in front of him. The fear that computers, by mistake or malice, might lead humanity to the brink of nuclear annihilation has haunted imaginations since the earliest days of the Cold War.

Lt. Col. Stanislav Petrov settled into the commander's chair in a secret bunker outside Moscow. His job that night was simple: Monitor the computers that were sifting through data from satellites and radar, watching the United States for any sign of a missile launch. It was just after midnight, Sept. 26, 1983. A single word flashed on the screen in front of him. The fear that computers, by mistake or malice, might lead humanity to the brink of nuclear annihilation has haunted imaginations since the earliest days of the Cold War.

A new RAND Corporation paper finds that artificial intelligence has the potential to upend the foundations of nuclear deterrence by the year 2040. While AI-controlled doomsday machines are considered unlikely, the hazards of artificial intelligence for nuclear security lie instead in its potential to encourage humans to take potentially apocalyptic risks, according to the paper. During the Cold War, the condition of mutual assured destruction maintained an uneasy peace between the superpowers by ensuring that any attack would be met by a devastating retaliation. Mutual assured destruction thereby encouraged strategic stability by reducing the incentives for either country to take actions that might escalate into a nuclear war. The new RAND publication says that in coming decades, artificial intelligence has the potential to erode the condition of mutual assured destruction and undermine strategic stability.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg's testimony before Congress made one thing clear: the government needs an Federal Artificial Intelligence Agency. Facebook FB, -0.26% is a canary in the proverbial AI coal mine. AI is going to play an enormous role in our lives and in the global economy. It is the key to self-driving cars, the Amazon AMZN, -0.63% Alexa in your home, autonomous trading desks on Wall Street, innovation in medicine, and cyberwar defenses. Technology is rarely good nor evil -- it's all in how humans use it.

The development of Artificial Intelligence is one to the most important events in recent human history. The final outcome of it, is still to be determined. At a moment when many might see the development of AI as potentially more threatening than beneficial, a growing coalition of researchers and innovators around the world tries to make sure that the opposite is the case. This movement towards "AI for Good", is gaining significant momentum and brings up relevant questions just at the right time. It also drives business and innovation in areas where Artificial Intelligence is used as a promising tool for sustainable development.

Today machine learning and artificial intelligence technologies are helping solve some of the biggest problems facing companies across the industrial spectrum. Boosting efficiency and production output in areas such as predictive maintenance and repair, defect detection and the optimization of supply chains, they are also starting to impact automated systems. In an increasingly digitized and hyper-connected world, almost every company generates and collects data. Ever more sophisticated machine learning (ML) algorithms can analyze this data to make predictions and refine processes. Combined with other advanced technologies such as the IoT, this is helping manufacturers gain a foothold in today's Industry 4.0 revolution.

Industry respondents are under no illusion that their industry will be insulated from revolutionising effects of AI. 43% said AI will enable new business models, while 81% said that AI will change or completely replace processes along the value chain. Respondents also believe that the technology will also reap efficiency benefits with the next five years.