WASHINGTON, May 23, 2023 – Experts on artificial intelligence disagree on whether licensing is the proper legislation for the technology. 

If adopted, licensing requirements would require companies to obtain a federal license prior to developing AI technology. Last week, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman testified that Congress should consider a series of licensing and testing requirements for AI models above a threshold of capability. 

At a Public Knowledge event Monday, Aalok Mehta, head of US Public Policy at OpenAI, added licensing is a means to ensuring that AI developers put together safety practices. By establishing licensing rules, we are developing external validation tools that will improve consumer experience, he said. 

Generative AI — the model used by chatbots including OpenAI’s widely popular ChatGPT and Google’s Bard — is AI designed to produce content rather than simply processing information, which could have widespread effects on copyright disputes and disinformation, experts have said. Many industry experts have urged for more federal AI regulation, claiming that widespread AI applications could lead to broad societal risks including an uptick in online disinformation, technological displacement, algorithmic discrimination, and other harms. 

Some industry leaders, however, are concerned that calls for licensing are a way of shutting the door to competition and new startups by large companies like OpenAI and Google.  

B Cavello, director of emerging technologies at the Aspen Institute, said Monday that licensing requirements place burdens on competition, particularly small start-ups. 

Implementing licensing requirements can place a threshold that defines a set of players allowed to play in the AI space and a set that are not, said B. Licensing can make it more difficult for smaller players to gain traction in the competitive space, B said.  

Already the resources required to support these systems create a barrier that can be really tough to break through, B continued. While there should be mandates for greater testing and transparency, it can also present unique challenges we should seek to avoid, B said.  

Austin Carson, founder and president of SeedAI, said a licensing model would not get to the heart of the issue, which is to make sure AI developers are consciously testing and measuring their own models. 

The most important thing is to support the development of an ecosystem that revolves around assurance and testing, said Carson. Although no mechanisms currently exist for wide-scale testing, it will be critical to the support of this technology, he said. 

Base-level testing at this scale will require that all parties participate, Carson emphasized. We need all parties to feel a sense of accountability for the systems they host, he said. 

Christina Montgomery, AI ethics board chair at IBM, urged Congress to adopt precision regulation approach to AI that would govern AI in specific use cases, not regulating the technology itself in her testimony last week.  

WASHINGTON, May 16, 2023 – Congress should increase regulatory requirements for transparency in artificial intelligence while adopting the technology in federal agencies, said witnesses at a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing on Tuesday. 

Many industry experts have urged for more federal AI regulation, claiming that widespread AI applications could lead to broad societal risks including an uptick in online disinformation, technological displacement, algorithmic discrimination, and other harms. 

The hearing addressed implementing AI in federal agencies. Congress is concerned about ensuring that the United States government is prepared to capitalize on the capabilities afforded by AI technology while also protecting the constitutional rights of citizens, said Sen. Gary Peters, D-Michigan.   

The United States “is suffering from a lack of leadership and prioritization on these topics,” stated Lynne Parker, director of AI Tennessee Initiative at the University of Tennessee in her comments. 

In a separate hearing Tuesday, CEO of OpenAI Sam Altman said that is is “essential that powerful AI is developed with democratic values in mind which mean US leadership is critical.”

Applications of AI are immensely beneficial, said Altman. However, “we think that regular intervention by governments will be crucial to mitigate the risks of increasingly powerful models.”

To do so, Altman suggested that the U.S. government consider a combination of licensing and testing requirements for the development and release of AI models above a certain threshold of capability.

Companies like OpenAI can partner with governments to ensure AI models adhere to a set of safety requirements, facilitate efficient processes, and examine opportunities for global coordination, he said.

Building accountability into AI systems

Siezing this moment to modernize the government’s systems will strengthen the country, said Daniel Ho, professor at Stanford Law School, encouraging Congress to lead by example to implement accountable AI practices.  

An accountable system ensures that agencies are responsible to report to the public and those that AI algorithms directly affect, added Richard Eppink of the American Civil Liberties Union of Idaho Foundation. 

A serious risk to implementing AI is that it can conceal how the systems work, including the bad data that they could be trained on, said Eppink. This can prevent accountability to the public and puts citizen’s constitutional rights at risk, he said. 

To prevent this, the federal government should implement transparency requirements and governance standards that would include transparency during the implementation process, said Eppink. Citizens have the right to the same information that the government has so we can maintain accountability, he concluded.  

Parker suggested that Congress appoint a Chief AI Director at each agency that would help develop Ai strategies for each agency and establish an interagency Chief AI Council to govern the use of the technology in the Federal government. 

Getting technical talent into the workforce is the predicate to a range of issues we are facing today, agreed Ho, claiming that less than two percent of AI personnel is in government. He urged Congress to establish pathways and trajectories for technical agencies to attract AI talent to public service.   

Congress considers AI regulation

Congress’s attention has been captured by growing AI regulatory concerns.  

In April, Senator Check Schumer, D-N.Y., proposed a high-level AI policy framework focused on ensuring transparency and accountability by requiring companies to allow independent experts to review and test AI technologies and make results available publicly. 

Later in April, Representative Yvette Clarke, D-N.Y., introduced a bill that would require the disclosure of AI-generated content in political ads. 

The Biden Administration announced on May 4 that it will invest $140 million in funding to launch seven new National AI Research Institutes, which investment will bring the total number of Institutes to 25 across the country.  

April 18, 2023 — Google CEO Sundar Pichai on Sunday called for increased regulation of artificial intelligence, warning that the rapidly developing technology poses broad societal risks.

“The pace at which we can think and adapt as societal institutions compared to the pace at which the technology’s evolving — there seems to be a mismatch,” Pichai said in an interview with CBS News.

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Widespread AI applications could lead to a dramatic uptick in online disinformation, as it becomes increasingly easy to create and spread fake news, images and videos, Pichai warned.

Google recently released a series of recommendations for regulating AI, advocating for “a sectoral approach that builds on existing regulation” and cautioning against “over-reliance on human oversight as a solution to AI issues.”

But the directive also noted that “while self-regulation is vital, it is not enough.”

Pichai emphasized this point, calling for broad multisector collaboration to best determine the shape of AI regulation.

“The development of this needs to include not just engineers, but social scientists, ethicists, philosophers and so on,” he said. “And I think these are all things society needs to figure out as we move along — it’s not for a company to decide.”

Republicans call to ban members of Congress from personal TikTok use

A group of Republican lawmakers on Monday urged the House and Senate rules committees to ban members of Congress from using TikTok, citing national security risks and the need to “lead by example.”

Congress banned use of the app on government devices in late 2022, but several elected officials have maintained accounts on their personal devices.

In Monday’s letter, Republican lawmakers argued that the recent hearing featuring TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew made it “blatantly clear to the public that the China-based app is mining data and potentially spying on American citizens.”

“It is troublesome that some members continue to disregard these clear warnings and are even encouraging their constituents to use TikTok to interface with their elected representatives – especially since some of these users are minors,” the letter continued.

TikTok is facing hostility from the other side of the aisle as well. On Thursday, Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., sent Chew a list of questions about the app’s privacy and safety practices that House Democrats claimed were left unanswered at the March hearing.

Meanwhile, Montana lawmakers voted Friday to ban TikTok on all personal devices, becoming the first state to pass such legislation. The bill now awaits the signature of Gov. Greg Gianforte — who was one of several state leaders last year to mimic Congress in banning TikTok from government devices.

Nine additional states join DOJ’s antitrust lawsuit against Google

The Justice Department announced on Monday that nine additional states joined its antitrust lawsuit over Google’s alleged abuse of the digital advertising market.

The Attorneys General of Arizona, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Washington and West Virginia joined the existing coalition of California, Colorado, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Tennessee and Virginia.

“We look forward to litigating this important case alongside our state law enforcement partners to end Google’s long-running monopoly in digital advertising technology markets,” said Doha Mekki, principal deputy assistant attorney general of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division.

The lawsuit alleges that Google monopolizes digital advertising technologies used for both buying and selling ads, said Jonathan Kanter, assistant attorney general of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division, when the suit was filed in January.

“Our complaint sets forth detailed allegations explaining how Google engaged in 15 years of sustained conduct that had — and continues to have — the effect of driving out rivals, diminishing competition, inflating advertising costs, reducing revenues for news publishers and content creators, snuffing out innovation, and harming the exchange of information and ideas in the public sphere,” Kanter said.