Ossoff: A.I. ‘existential threat’ to human rights

Congress should put guardrails around rapidly developing artificial intelligence technology to thwart criminal scammers inside the U.S. and rein in China’s use of AI to oppress dissidents, witnesses told a U.S. Senate subcommittee Tuesday.

Jennifer DeStefano of Scottsdale, Ariz., described the harrowing experience of getting a phone call from her daughter saying she had been kidnapped, only to discover later that her daughter was safe at home and she had been listening to an AI-generated “deepfake” of her daughter’s voice.

“I will never be able to shake that voice and the desperate cry for help from my mind,” DeStefano told the Senate Human Rights Subcommittee, chaired by Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga. “There’s no limit to the evil AI can bring. If left uncontrolled and unregulated, it will rewrite the concept of what is real and what is not.”

In DeStefano’s case, police were unable to prosecute because she discovered the scam before any ransom was paid to the fake kidnappers. Thus, no crime was committed.

“This conduct should be criminal and severely punished,” Ossoff said after DeStefano’s presentation.

Ossoff described the growth of artificial intelligence technology as an “existential threat” on multiple fronts. It can be used to invade Americans’ privacy, disrupt labor markets by replacing jobs now being done by humans, influence the future of warfare, destabilize politics and threaten the nation’s cybersecurity, he said.

At the same time, AI promises to increase economic productivity, diagnose cancer and produce life-saving drugs, Ossoff said.

“It is imperative that Congress understand the full range of risks and potential,” he said.

Geoffrey Cain, senior fellow at the Foundation for American Innovation, a nonprofit that advocates using technology to promote freedom, said China is using AI to target protesters and ethnic minorities, including the Muslim Uyghurs of Western China. AI can be used to detect when someone anywhere in China unfurls a banner or when and where foreign journalists travel inside the country, Cain said.

“China can’t be trusted to help build guardrails for AI,” he said. “It will transform generative AI into a state tool for oppression.”

Cain suggested Congress stop American technologists from helping China develop its AI capabilities with legislation imposing prison time on those who do.

Alexandra Reeve Givens, CEO of the Center for Democracy & Technology, said AI technology is also being used in this country to violate human rights. She said Florida and Maryland have used it to identify protestors, while a Georgia man was held in a local jail for days due to a false AI identification.

Givens said Congress should require AI companies to develop safety standards and fund efforts to develop technology that will detect deepfakes.