The United States “totally” rejects global governance of artificial intelligence, White House technology adviser Michael Kratsios said on Friday while attending an India summit on artificial intelligence, AFP reported.
Kratsios, who heads the country’s delegation to a major AI summit being held in New Delhi, made the remarks ahead of an expected statement by leaders that will set out a shared vision for how to deal with the divisive technology.
“As the Trump administration has now said many times: We absolutely reject the global governance of AI,” he said, adding that the technology cannot lead to a brighter future if it is controlled by bureaucracy and central authorities.
What does the panel of experts want to do?
UN chief Antonio Guterres announced on Friday that a new expert panel convened by the global body has been created to “make human control a technical reality”.
According to Guterres, the advisory group, which was created in August last year, is to serve as the AI counterpart to the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). He also said that all 40 members of the panel are now confirmed, according to a news report.
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The AI Impact Summit is the fourth annual international meeting with a special focus on the risks and opportunities presented by advanced computing. This year it was held at the Bharat Mandapam in Delhi.
The event brought together dozens of world leaders and ministers from around the world to provide a shared perspective on how to deal with artificial intelligence.
Why are executives opposed to “overregulation”?
At last year’s AI Summit in Paris, US Vice President JD Vance warned against “excessive regulation” and said such a move “could kill the transformative sector”.
In New Delhi, Kratsios said that “the international discussion on AI has evolved, as this summit confirms,” noting that the meeting’s title had changed from “AI Safety” to “AI Impact.”
Echoing Vance’s earlier statement, a White House official said the development of artificial intelligence is clearly a “positive development,” but “too many international forums, such as the UN Global Dialogue on Artificial Intelligence Governance, perpetuate a general atmosphere of fear,” he said.
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“We need to replace this fear with hope,” Kratsios added, noting that artificial intelligence has the potential to “enhance human flourishing and ensure unprecedented prosperity.”
He argued that “risk-focused ideological obsessions like climate or justice become excuses for bureaucratic control and centralization”.
“In the name of security, they increase the danger that these tools will be used for tyrannical control.”
“The focus of AI policy on security and speculative risks … limits the competitive ecosystem, consolidates incumbents and isolates developing countries from full participation in the AI economy,” Kratsios said during the AI Summit.
The AI Summit featured an ambitious program of 700 sessions over its lifetime, covering topics such as AI security, governance, ethics, data protection, AI sovereign capabilities and the future of work.