'Adversaries harnessing AI as weapon': Microsoft's chief scientist favors to guide not pause the use of AI
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Microsoft's Chief Scientific Officer, Eric Horvitz, has expressed worries and potential about using artificial intelligence (AI) in a new interview.
Per the candid interview published by Fortune Magazine on Monday, Horvitz voiced his concerns about using AI tools for deception, manipulation, and impersonation.
"There will always be bad actors and competitors and adversaries harnessing [AI] as weapons because it's a stunningly powerful new set of capabilities," said Horvitz,
"I live in this, knowing this is coming. And it's going faster than we thought."
Horvitz observed that they are currently open-source technology, making it difficult to regulate them simply and that they would soon be out of control. For instance, deep fakes could sway public opinion, which is devastating for democracies.
Horvitz emphasized his concern over the potential erosion of democracy, which depends on an informed populace to function efficiently, and the use of disinformation techniques by bad actors.
He continued by saying that it is unclear whether there would be an effective democracy if there were systems that could deceive and manipulate.
"I think this is a really critical issue, not just for the United States, but for other countries, and it needs to be addressed," he said.
According to Horvitz, Microsoft started a significant effort across numerous teams to develop what they call "the authentication of media provenance" to ensure that no one had altered photographs or videos taken from reliable news sources.
Horvitz on pausing AI
Speaking about the Elon Musk-backed letter that sought AI labs to pause tech more powerful than OpenAI's ChatGPT-4 for six months, Horvitz stated:
"In a larger sense, six months doesn't really mean very much for a pause. We need to really just invest more in understanding and guiding and even regulating this technology—jump in, as opposed to pause…"
"I do think that it's more of a distraction, but I like the idea that it's a call for expressing anxiety and discomfort with the speed. And that's clear to everybody," he added.
"Science-fiction-centric ideas" that make people afraid of AI taking over, where these machines somehow "outsmart humans" —are the things that worry Horvitz the least.
Some of the signatories to the open letter, which included over 20,000 tech influencers and celebrities, fixate on this particular scenario.
Horvitz also addressed recent worries about AI ethics at Microsoft and job cuts, claiming that the layoffs were unrelated to the company's main AI initiatives.
In the past, the CSO has overseen important ethics and trustworthiness initiatives to govern the company's technology deployment and studies into its potential and eventual impact of AI.
The interview first appeared in Fortune Magazine's online edition. You can read it here.
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