As ChatGPT’s popularity exploded, US lawmakers took interest

By Diane Bartz

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – ChatGPT, a fast-growing artificial intelligence program, has drawn praise for its ability to quickly write answers to a wide range of questions, and has drawn the attention of U.S. lawmakers with questions about its impact on national security and education.

ChatGPT was estimated to have reached 100 million monthly active users just two months after launch, making it the fastest growing consumer application in history and a growing target for regulation.

It is developed by OpenAI, a non-governmental organization supported by Microsoft Corporation and made available to the public for free. Its ubiquity has raised fears that generative AI like ChatGPT could be used to spread confusion, while educators worry that it will be used by students to cheat.

Representative Ted Lew, a Democrat on the House of Representatives Science Committee, said in a recent opinion piece in the New York Times that he is excited about AI and the “incredible ways it will advance society,” but is “dismayed by AI, especially AI that is kept unchecked and unregulated. .”

Liu introduced a resolution written by ChatGPT that said Congress should focus on AI “developing and deploying AI in a way that is safe, ethical, and respects the rights and privacy of all Americans, and the benefits of AI being widely distributed and minimizing the risks.” either.”

In January, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman visited Capitol Hill where he met with tech-oriented lawmakers such as Senators Mark Warner, Ron Wyden and Richard Blumenthal and Representative Jake Auchincloss, according to Democratic lawmaker aides.

A Wyden aide said the lawmaker pressed Altman to make sure AI doesn’t include biases that would lead to discrimination in the real world, such as housing or jobs.

“While Senator Wyden believes that AI has tremendous potential to accelerate innovation and research, he is laser-focused on ensuring that automated systems do not automate discrimination in the process,” said Keith Chu, a Wyden aide.

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A second congressional aide described the discussions as focused on the pace of change in AI and how it can be used.

Due to concerns about plagiarism, ChatGPT has already been banned in schools in New York and Seattle, according to media reports. A congressional aide said the concern they’re hearing from constituents comes largely from academics focused on fraud.

OpenAI said in a statement: “We don’t want ChatGPT to be used for misleading purposes in schools or elsewhere, so we’re already developing mitigations to help identify text generated by that system.”

In an interview with TIME, OpenAI’s chief technology officer Meera Murati said the company welcomes input from regulators and governments. “It’s not too early (for regulators to get involved),” he said.

Andrew Burt, managing partner at BNH.AI, a law firm focused on AI liability, pointed to national security concerns, adding that he has spoken to lawmakers who are studying whether to regulate similar AI systems like ChatGPT and Google’s Bird. are doing, though he said he could not reveal their names.

“The whole value proposition of these kinds of AI systems is that they can create content at a scale and speed that humans simply can’t,” he said.

“I would expect malicious actors, non-state actors and state actors with interests that are adversarial to the United States, to use these systems to generate information that could be inaccurate or harmful.”

ChatGPT itself, when asked how it should be regulated, demurred and said: “As a neutral AI language model, I have no position on specific laws that may or may not be enacted to regulate AI systems like mine. .” But it then lists potential areas of focus for regulators, such as data privacy, bias and fairness, and transparency in how answers are written.

(Reporting by Diane Bartz; Additional reporting by Suzanne Smalley and Jeffrey Dustin; Editing by Chris Sanders and Daniel Wallis)