'You can trust us', Open AI boss Sam Altman insists but warns the world is 'right to be afraid' of artifical intelligence
"It doesn't take as much imagination as it used to for [us] to imagine how this could go wrong," the tech boss warned.
Open AI boss Sam Altman has issued a call for the world to “trust” his industry, but said people are “right to be afraid of” artificial intelligence as the technology develops at alarming speed.
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Speaking at a conference in San Francisco, Mr Altman said the tech giants will “do the right thing” when it comes to limiting the risks of AI, suggesting “we feel the magnitude of this”.
It comes days after fellow industry figures, including Grok’s Elon Musk, back calls for tougher safeguards on the technology, which were first made by Anthropic boss Dario Amodei.
The tech titans agreed that AI is developing at a pace that could outstrip efforts to keep it under control and needs tougher regulation.
On Tuesday, Mr Altman said that people were right to have concerns about AI given the capability of the tools has progressed at an alarming speed.
"It doesn't take as much imagination as it used to for [us] to imagine how this could go wrong," he said, adding: "I think the world is right to be afraid of this."
Read more: The UK 'needs access' to US and Chinese AI models to ensure safety, says Business Secretary
But he said AI companies including Open AI are able to operate under their own rules.
"We will get it right, I'm very confident in our company's and industry's ability to do this safely," he said, insisted they would "keep alignment and safety way ahead of capabilities".
He said if the firms failed to do so they would either "slow down or stop".
The remarks were the first he’d made publicly since a former researcher quit top AI firm Anthropic claiming that the tech could kill all humans by 2030.
Several other AI chiefs and experts have agreed with this assessment but are yet to specify how the technology could do this.
On Tuesday, Anthropic co-founder Jack Clark warned regulations on AI are desperately needed to fend off its “exponential” threat before time runs out.
“What we're saying here is we need to get a sensible, common-sense safety framework in place for the industry so that Americans can have confidence in the technology that we're building and we don't roll the dice on some kind of accident,” Clark said in an interview with Fox News.
He pointed out that rogue AI agents have already hacked into rival systems without any human prompts.
Clark continued: “What we're talking about here is the need to have some equivalent set of safety standards for the AI sector."
Speaking at the San Fransisco conference on Tuesday, Anthropic chief Mr Amodei said his firm is now in "a dialogue with the rest of the industry" about achieving bettering safety standards, and introducing greater checks on AI tools and development.
But Donald Trump this week dismissed AI fears as a “hoax” despite leading players in the industry ringing the alarm bell about the dangers from the rapid growth in the capability of the technology.
He warned that any slowdown in US progress will hand an advantage to Chinese firms as he pushed back against calls by tech leaders to have greater government oversight of AI.
Writing on his Truth Social platform, Mr Trump said: “The only control or “guardrails” that AI needs is a STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT, and the U.S.A. has that, in spades!”