The 3 Most Important AI Policy Milestones in 2023

TIME

AI’s rapid technological progress and the dire warnings from its creators provoked a reaction in capitals around the world. Here are the three most important milestones in AI policy this year.

Transcript

00:00 I'm Will Henshaw and I've been writing a lot about AI policy for time in 2023.

00:04 And it's been a really important year for AI policy.

00:06 ChatGPT exploded onto the scene in November 2022.

00:10 Then in May of 2023, numerous experts expressed their concern about the risks that very powerful

00:15 AI systems could pose in future, some warning about catastrophic or even existential risks.

00:21 Now, all of this caused officials and politicians around the world in capitals to sit up and

00:25 pay attention to AI.

00:26 Here are three of the biggest moments in AI policy from 2023.

00:31 First, in October, President Biden signed an executive order on artificial intelligence.

00:39 Officials have been working on this for months and it shows.

00:41 It's 63 pages long and it has something for everyone.

00:44 From those worried about the risks that very powerful AI systems could pose in future,

00:48 to those concerned about labor market impacts from AI and how people could lose their jobs,

00:53 and to those who want the government to more enthusiastically embrace the use of AI to

00:56 deliver public services.

00:58 Second, politicians from 29 countries gathered in Bletchley Park in the UK for an AI safety

01:04 summit.

01:05 The countries, which included the US, China, the EU and the UK, signed a joint declaration.

01:10 They also secured commitments to safety policies from the companies developing the most powerful

01:14 AI systems.

01:15 Perhaps most importantly, the participant countries agreed to meet again twice in 2024,

01:20 in South Korea in May and then in France in September.

01:23 Finally, in the EU, lawmakers reached a provisional agreement on the EU AI Act, which will be

01:29 the world's first comprehensive AI law.

01:32 The Act, as currently agreed, would ban certain uses of AI, such as emotion recognition systems

01:37 used in workplaces or in schools, and would also impose strict regulation on AI used in

01:42 high-risk areas, such as law enforcement and education.

01:46 However, lower-level technical negotiations will continue into 2024 to settle the final

01:51 details of the Act.

01:53 And even after that, the Act won't come into force until two years after it's passed.

01:57 But apart from that, 2024 is going to be another big year for AI policy.

02:01 In the US, efforts to pass AI legislation are being led by Senate Majority Leader Chuck

02:06 Schumer, but they'll need to move fast in order to bear fruit before the presidential

02:10 election takes over Washington.

02:12 The UN's AI advisory body will make recommendations for how a potential UN AI agency could look

02:17 by the end of August.

02:19 In addition to these two things, the world's two AI superpowers, the US and China, are

02:23 going to continue to vie for technological superiority.

02:26 Both countries will continue to invest huge amounts in development.

02:29 Plus, at the speed AI is moving, there's likely to be much more besides this.

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