Senate urged to punish US companies that help China build its AI-driven 'surveillance state'

AGI, while powerful, could have negative consequences, warned Diveplane CEO Mike Capps and Liberty Blockchain CCO Christopher Alexander. U.S. companies that give China artificial intelligence-driven technology to violate the human rights of its citizens need to be punished by Congress with prison terms for U.S. executives, a witness told senators in a hearing Tuesday. Geoffrey Cain, senior fellow at the Foundation for American Innovation, warned at a Senate Judiciary subcommittee hearing that AI is helping to power China's growing "surveillance state" and said U.S. companies have contributed to this human rights problem. "China built its AI surveillance apparatus with the connivance and complacency of major American technology firms," Cain said in his prepared remarks. "The science corporation ThermoFisher, for example, was caught selling DNA collection equipment directly to Xinjiang police authorities, who used them for mass gathering of genetic data on the minority Uyghur population. "Since the late 1990s, Microsoft has established itself as the training ground for China's AI elites through its Beijing-based laboratory, Microsoft Research Asia," he added. "The laboratory has trained many of the AI leaders and developers who went on to found or join the executive leadership of rights-abusing firms, such as Sensetime, Megvii and iFlyTek." Chinese President Xi Jinping is overseeing an AI-driven surveillance state, according to a witness at a Senate hearing Tuesday who said U.S. companies that help China should be punished. Cain's group, the Foundation for American Innovation, said it was founded to ensure technology is "aligned to serve human ends: promoting individual freedom, supporting strong institutions, advancing national security, and unleashing economic prosperity.