politico
Anthropic's AI safety bill would pause AI models if 50 people could die
Trending Now Mashable Selects Look Up Mashable's Best: E-readers, robovacs, laptops, earbuds, smart home and more Getting Technical with Mashable Gift Ideas For Everyone On Your List Say More Versus In My Bag Mashable @Home Top creators, ranked Creator Playbook All Series Anthropic's AI safety bill would pause AI models if 50+ people could die Should the AI companies be writing AI safety laws? Matt Binder joined Mashable's tech vertical in 2018, where he covers social media, tech policy, cybersecurity, online scams, cryptocurrency, AI, creator news, weird tech, and other related tech beats. Anthropic has some interesting ideas regarding what an AI safety bill should look like. As concern grows regarding the dangers of artificial intelligence, AI regulation has become a hot topic in both Silicon Valley and Washington, D.C. AI giant Anthropic, the maker of Claude, has been pitching its own set of AI safety rules to lawmakers, and Politico recently obtained a confidential draft of the company's proposals. So, what's in Anthropic's proposed AI safety bill?
Anthropic is pitching Congress its own AI safety bill, report says
Mashable's Best: E-readers, robovacs, laptops, earbuds, smart home and more Mashable Selects Gift Ideas For Everyone On Your List Say More Versus Trending Now Look Up In My Bag Mashable @Home Top creators, ranked Creator Playbook AI at School All Series The draft would let the government halt a frontier AI model only in extreme cases, and only through a federal judge. Chance Townsend is the General Assignments Editor at Mashable, covering tech, video games, dating apps, digital culture, and whatever else comes his way. He has a Master's in Journalism from the University of North Texas and is a proud orange cat father. His writing has also appeared in PC Mag and . Anthropic has been privately pitching lawmakers on a draft bill to regulate frontier AI safety and security, POLITICO reported Friday .
AI-generated bills are reportedly causing problems in the Capitol
The House Office of Legislative Counsel is swamped with AI-generated bills that are riddled with wrong terms, incorrect citations and other mistakes, according to Politico. More and more representatives' offices are using publicly available general AI tools like ChatGPT and Claude to write their legislative proposals. Politico's sources said lawyers at the US House Office of Legislative Counsel (OLC) are spending more time to review and rewrite them than they would have if they had written the bills from scratch. The sources explained that AI tools tend to miss nuances and tiny crucial details, which could have a huge effect on how a law is interpreted and enacted. Wade Ballou, who headed the office for almost 10 years until 2024, said AI can't determine whether a pot of money should be a "tax credit, tax deduction, tax exclusion or a grant," for instance.
The US Court Records System Has Been Hacked
This is the week of Black Hat and Defcon, which means a flood of news coming out of the Las Vegas security conferences. As you might expect, artificial intelligence was one popular topic--specifically, using AI chatbots to cause mischief. One team of researchers, from Tel Aviv University, created a clever attack that allowed them to take over a target's smart home devices using a "poisoned" Google Calendar invite. It's the first known attack method that used AI to impact physical devices. Another researcher used a poisoned document that included a malicious prompt to trick ChatGPT into leaking a user's private information when it's connected to a Google Drive.
Politico's Newsroom Is Starting a Legal Battle With Management Over AI
Politico became one of the first newsrooms last year to win a union contract that included rules on how the media outlet can deploy artificial intelligence. The PEN Guild, which represents Politico and its sister publication, environment and energy site E&E News, is now gearing up for another first. The union's members allege that the AI provisions in their contract have been violated, and they're preparing for a groundbreaking legal dispute with management. The outcome could set a precedent for how much input journalists ultimately have over how AI is used in their newsrooms. Last year, Politico began publishing AI-generated live news summaries during big political events like the Democratic National Convention and the US vice presidential debates.
The EU wants to criminalize AI-generated porn images and deepfakes
Back in 2022, the European Commission released a proposal for a directive on how to combat domestic violence and violence against women in other forms. Now, the European Council and Parliament have agreed with the proposal to criminalize, among other things, different types of cyber-violence. The proposed rules will criminalize the non-consensual sharing of intimate images, including deepfakes made by AI tools, which could help deter revenge porn. Cyber-stalking, online harassment, misogynous hate speech and "cyber-flashing," or the sending of unsolicited nudes, will also be recognized as criminal offenses. The commission says that having a directive for the whole European Union that specifically addresses those particular acts will help victims in Member States that haven't criminalized them yet.
Rishi Sunak to pitch UK as world leader of AI during meeting with Biden: report
WATCH LIVE: VP Harris meets with UK PM Rishi Sunak in Munich. British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is reportedly hoping to pitch the United Kingdom as a world leader in artificial intelligence governance during his meeting with President Joe Biden. But a post-Brexit U.K. has been locked out of key discussions between the United States and the European Union, such as the fourth Tech and Trade Council (TTC) meeting in Sweden. The White House said both the U.S. and EU recommitted to deepening cooperation on setting AI standards in line with democratic values and universal human rights and work together on emerging technologies "with like-minded partners." Politico reported in March that the Biden administration, meanwhile, has quietly rebuffed British officials' repeated requests for greater dialogue between Washington, D.C., and the U.K. regarding setting AI standards.
Timnit Gebru's anti-'AI pause' - POLITICO
Then-Google AI Research Scientist Timnit Gebru speaks during the TechCrunch Disrupt SF 2018 conference. Last Thursday POLITICO's Mark Scott, author of the Digital Bridge newsletter, interviewed the computer scientist and activist Timnit Gebru about a recent open letter from her Distributed AI Research Institute that argued -- contra the Future of Life Institute's high-profile letter calling for an "AI pause" -- that the major harms caused by AI are already here, and therefore "Regulatory efforts should focus on transparency, accountability and preventing exploitative labor practices." Mark asked her what she thinks regulators' role should be in this fast-moving landscape, and how society might take a more proactive approach to shaping AI before it simply shapes us. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity. Why is it important to increase the transparency and accountability for how AI systems are deployed, and how would it benefit people's understanding of how the technology works?
Digital Bridge: AI reality check -- Global privacy battle -- Mission 'Critical' – POLITICO
I'm Mark Scott, POLITICO's chief technology correspondent, and after a week of vacation, I'm honestly struggling to get myself up and running this week. With that in mind, here's the pep song that has been keeping me going as I've written this week's newsletter. Warning: it'll get stuck in your mind. We'll tell you where to look for it. HERE'S MY PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT OF THE WEEK: let's cool the hype around OpenAI, Google's Bard and the sudden tsunami of so-called generative artificial intelligence use cases that have just popped up (looking at you, Pope in a puffer coat.)