BLETCHLEY PARK (United Kingdom): UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called Thursday for a “united, sustained, global response” to artificial intelligence threats, as world leaders met in Britain to discuss the risks posed by the technology’s rapid development.
The UN chief said the world was “playing catchup” and needed to “get ahead of the wave”, as he spoke at the inaugural AI Safety Summit attended by political, tech and other leaders.
The two-day gathering at Bletchley Park, north of London, kicked off Wednesday with the publication of an agreement signed by 28 countries and the European Union acknowledging the “need for international action”.
But Thursday saw senior representatives from leading nations formally convene to address AI’s most pressing imminent threats, with UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and US Vice President Kamala Harris in attendance.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and EU chief Ursula von der Leyen also joined government officials from France, Germany, Australia and elsewhere, as well as leading tech figures including Elon Musk.
In a statement, Guterres said AI risked “possible long-term negative consequences” — on everything from jobs to culture — while its concentration in a few countries and companies “could increase geopolitical tensions”.
He also warned that it might “exacerbate the enormous inequalities that already plague our world”, demanding a “united, sustained, global strategy, based on multilateralism and the participation of all stakeholders”.
New solutions should be based on existing principles found in his organisation’s 1945 charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, he added.
The release of ChatGPT and other generative AI systems, which are capable of quickly producing text, images and audio from simple commands in everyday language, has captivated the public and offered a glimpse into the technology’s potential.
The summit coincided with the release of a “new” Beatles song produced with AI’s assistance more than four decades after it was originally recorded as a demo.
But the emergent tech has also prompted concerns around issues ranging from job losses to cyberattacks and the control that humans actually have over the systems.
Sunak has predicted it will radically alter society for generations to come, striking an alarmist tone in a recent speech warning of its potential dangers.
The UK leader planned to “make the case for global responsibility to address the risks in order to seize the opportunities of AI,” his Downing Street office said ahead of Thursday.
He is trying to get other countries to follow the UK’s plans for state-backed testing and evaluation of cutting-edge AI models before they are released.
London and Washington this week both announced the establishment of institutes to take up the challenge. Harris told delegates of US efforts to help distinguish authentic government-produced digital content from AI-generated content, and to prevent the use of discriminatory AI algorithms, her office said.
“The late Stephen Hawking once said, AI is likely to be the best or worst thing to happen to humanity,” Sunak told a news conference wrapping up the summit.
“If we can sustain the collaboration that we have fostered over these last two days, I profoundly believe that we can make it the best.”