The Biden administration today took another step in Washington’s efforts to regulate new types of artificial intelligence.
President Biden is new executive orderIt takes a “whole-of-government” approach to reining in largely unregulated areas, with a slew of orders to government agencies and requests and proposals to the private sector.
This executive order seeks to set new standards for how AI is developed, tested, and used in government as well as private industry.
Meredith Broussard is the author of a new book on bias in AI and technology and teaches at New York University. She said this order is a big deal.
“What it says is that the developers of the most powerful AI systems must share safety test results and other important information with the government,” she said.
Tools must also be developed to ensure that AI systems are safe for consumers.
It’s less clear whether the Biden administration can force companies to do this without legislation from Congress.
Neil Chilson is Center for Growth and Opportunity at Utah State University.
“While probably within the president’s authority, there are some potentially questionable matters that require additional guidance,” he said. “There was a lot of, ‘Hey, let’s use existing legal authorities to look into this.'”
Chilson said it will likely take months, if not years, for new regulations to become reality.
But on the other hand, AI is already helping people make decisions that impact their lives.
Alexandra Reeve Givens is president and CEO of the Center for Democracy and Technology.
“If you recently applied for a job, applied for a loan, applied for housing approval, applied for public benefits, an AI system is being used in each of those moments,” she said. Ta.
Givens said one way the Biden administration hopes to influence these systems is by updating rules on the billions of dollars the federal government spends on purchasing goods and services from the private sector. said.
“If you’re a contractor trying to sell a system to the federal government…this is going to set up kind of a new standard that you’ll need to prove you’re compliant.” she said.
And when you’re talking about that kind of money, that kind of influence can be deployed more quickly.
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