Washington, (EFE).- Great figures in the technology industry such as Elon Musk, from X (formerly Twitter); Mark Zuckerberg, from Meta; or Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft, participated in a closed-door session of the United States Senate in which they agreed on the need to regulate artificial intelligence (AI).
Also at the meeting, called by the leader of the Democrats in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, were the executive directors of OpenAI, Sam Altman; from Google, Sundar Pichai; and from Microsoft, Satya Nadella, among others.
Schumer asked the businessmen if they agreed to regulate artificial intelligence and “each of them raised their hand despite having different opinions,” the senator himself revealed to the press after the session.
Benefits and challenges of AI
The leader of the Democrats in the Upper House called this forum so that senators can learn about the benefits and challenges of AI, which took a big step last year with the launch of ChatGPT, a tool capable of writing texts as if It would be a human.
Schumer was convinced that Congress “has to try to act, no matter how difficult the process may be” in the face of this technology that is advancing by leaps and bounds.
Speaking to the press as he left the Senate, Musk, head of X, Space X and Tesla, warned of the risk that artificial intelligence could be harmful.
For this reason, he defended regulating it and, in that sense, he believed that the meeting in the Senate was “very important for the future of human civilization.”
“Schumer asked us to raise our hands to see if we were in favor of regulating AI, and I think almost all of us did,” he explained.
For his part, Zuckerberg told senators that “Congress should collaborate with artificial intelligence in favor of innovation and guarantees.”
“This is an emerging technology, so there are issues that must be addressed and ultimately it is up to the authorities to do so,” he explained, according to a transcript of his words published by Meta.
Congress should collaborate with AI
About 60 of the 100 senators in the chamber attended the session, although there were voices that criticized that the press could not be at the meeting.
That’s why I agree that Congress should work with AI to support innovation and safeguards. This is an emerging technology, there are important actions to balance here.
“I don’t understand why we invite the world’s big monopolists to Congress to give us advice on how to help them make more money and then close the session to the public,” reproached Republican Josh Hawley.
Microsoft President Brad Smith on Tuesday supported the US Government establishing an independent agency to regulate the uses of artificial intelligence.
Just two months ago, the country’s big technology companies accepted a series of security measures proposed by the White House that contemplate the creation of internal and external tests of their AI systems before making them public.
The US government also said it is working to translate voluntary commitments by US companies into an international framework on the use of AI, adding that it has already held consultations with countries such as Brazil, Canada, South Korea, France, Germany, India, Israel, Japan, Mexico and the United Kingdom.
