Genies and Their Fragile Bottles

More than 350 tech leaders, academics and engineers — the people who best understand artificial intelligence — have signed a dramatic statement, warning AI could be a global threat to humanity on the scale of pandemics and nuclear war. But who's listening?

"At the heart of the divide between Altman and OpenAI's directors is whether AI should be a commercial opportunity-- or is a potentially dangerous technology that needs to be checked and scrutinized at every turn."

"The board clashed with Altman and Brockman, who both argued that OpenAI was growing its business out of necessity. Every time a customer asks OpenAI's ChatGPT chatbot a question, it requires huge amounts of expensive computing power -- so much that the company was having trouble keeping up with the explosive demand from users."

"The company was forced to cap the number of times users can query its most powerful AI models daily. In fact, the situation got so dire that Altman at one point announced the company was pausing sign-ups for its paid ChatGPT Plus service indefinitely."

"From Altman's point of view, raising money and finding additional revenue sources were essential. But some members of the board, with ties to the AI-skeptical altruism movement, viewed this in tension with the risks posed by advanced AI."

"Many effective altruists -- a pseudo-philosophical movement that seeks to donate money to head off existential risks -- have imagined scenarios in which a powerful AI system could be used by a terrorist group to, say, create a bio-weapon."

Shirin Ghaffary, Rachel Metz, Peter Elstrom, Vlad Savov, Bloomberg 

Sam Altman (L), US entrepreneur, investor, programmer, and founder and CEO of artificial intelligence company OpenAI, and the company’s co-founder and chief scientist Ilya Sutskever, speak together at Tel Aviv University in Tel Aviv on June 5, 2023.  Jack Guez | Afp | Getty Images

 

Following the shock waves that reverberated through the world of technology at the surprise news that the board of OpenAI had fired its CEO, Sam Altman last week, over 700 of the startups' staff signed a letter threatening to quit en masse should the board not resign and Altman be re-hired -- who in the interim was recruited by Microsoft Corp. to operate a new artificial intelligence team, anxious to support its investment as OpenAI's largest shareholder. 

OpenAI's board defied calls from investors and top executives to reinstall Altman, fired after disagreements with the board on how fast to develop and monetize artificial intelligence. Even Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella who hired Altman for Microsoft's future AI plan development, wouldn't oppose Altman's reinstatement, he said. It makes little difference to Microsoft, he stated, whether Altman runs OpenAI or works under Microsoft; it is prepared to invest up to $13 billion to keep it operational.

So, surprise, surprise, monetization is a powerful incentive for investors who, after all had their way and so did all those employees of OpenAI who demanded Sam Altman's return and an overhaul of the board's directors. Silicon Valley and the global AI industry just heaved a huge sigh of relief. OpenAI is now busy "to figure out the details", it posted on X. With Altman returning as chief executive, the initial new board is to be led by Bret Taylor, former co-CEO of Salesforce Inc, along with Larry Summers, former U.S. Treasury Secretary, and existing member Adam D'Angelo, co-founder and CEO of Quora Inc.

Sam Altman is seen attending an AI-related event at the Asia-Pacific Economics Cooperation Leaders' Week in San Francisco last week. Altman was briefly ousted from his role as OpenAI CEO last Friday. By Tuesday, he'd been hired back. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP/Getty Images)

Triumph and Fear

Emmett Shear was the former boss of video-sharing platform Twitch   Getty Images

"It's clear that the process and communications around Sam's removal has been handled very badly, which has seriously damaged our trust."

"[I plan to] reform the management and leadership team in light of recent departures into an effective force."

"[I will take action to] drive changes in the organization, [including] significant governance changes if necessary."

"[I] took this job because I believe that OpenAI is one of the most important companies currently in existence."

"If there is a world where we survive ... where we build an AI that's smarter than humans and survive it, it's going to be because we built smaller AIs than that, and we actually had as many smart people as we can working on that, and taking the problem seriously."

Former Twitch leader Emmett Shear, interim CEO, OpenAI

OpenAI co-founder Sam Altman was fired as chief executive  EPA

 

The wider world may be mostly oblivious to the concerns of IA researchers and scientists in the potential inherent in further development of artificial intelligence making great strides in assuming the heights of human intelligence and surpassing them to create a potential army of hostility that would be beyond human control, but the triumph of achievement in AI and the fear of the potential rest uneasily in the minds of its developers.

That cautionary note expressed by Emmett Shear: "If there is a world where we survive ... where we build an AI that's smarter than humans and survive it ..." is fodder for deep thought in the minds of those responsible for the emergence of the situation and perhaps to a greater degree, the eventual outcome. In the world these programming geniuses have succeeded in producing, humankind derives great benefits and at the same time has introduced a flirtation with possible danger.

OpenAI's decision to fire one of its foremost thinkers and developers, one of the architects of OpenAI certainly shocked the world of AI development and communications. OpenAI's chatbot ChatGPT, began a chase to continue developing artificial intelligence, setting aside the concerns of many at the forefront of the enterprise that brought it to life. For OpenAI, an interim CEO moved in while former (fired) CEO Sam Altman and former president Greg Brockman were snapped up by Microsoft to lead the corporation's new AI research team.

 

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella speaking at a OpenIA Dev Day  Nov 6. Justin Sullivan, Getty

 

Microsoft chairman and CEO Satya Nadella saw an opportunity and grasped it, bringing the two aboard, while at the same time ensuring that the collaboration between Microsoft and OpenAI would continue with the venture that Microsoft invested billions in, to help provide OpenAI with the massive computing power required for the operation of its AI systems.

Nadella posted on X he was "extremely excited" to bring on the former executives of OpenAI, looking "forward to getting to know" the new CEO Shear as well; both committed to their partnership. "We are going to build something new & it will be incredible", wrote Brockman. More 'incredible' than what has already been achieved, with its benefits and concerns in equal measure?

As for the firing of Sam Altman and the consequential departure of two others from OpenAI, Shear noted that Altman was removed by the board for a reason that was not a "specific disagreement on safety". The board had stated that Altman's behaviour -- in not being totally frank -- was effectively setting back the board's capacity to exercise its responsibilities.

"Hundreds of OpenAI employees signed a letter calling on the board to step down after it was unable to reach an agreement to bring back ousted CEO Sam Altman.

"Altman, whose departure from OpenAI was announced Friday, joined Microsoft early Monday after a weekend of boardroom drama that sent shock waves across Silicon Valley."

"Altman will lead a new artificial intelligence project at Microsoft, the tech giant said early Monday after rumors swirled that he could make a dramatic return to the company he helped build into one of the world's hottest startups."
NBC News

Viral Virus Alert!

"The modus operandi was to send a pop-up on people's systems using a fake Microsoft logo."
Ajay Pal Sharma, senior police superintendent, Gautam Budh Nagar suburb, Delhi

"The success of the legitimate industry [call centers in India] has made it easier for the illegitimate industry [to operate and appear genuine]."
Courtney Gregoire, assistant general counsel, Microsoft digital crimes unit

Researchers at Stony Brook University in New York State published a study of tech-support scams last year, estimating in their summation that a 142-web-domain pop-up campaign succeeded in enriching its participants by ten million dollars in the space of two months of operation. It was, according to Najmeh Miramirkhani, the paper's lead author, a complex network of entities, some of whom made their own calls while others outsourced calls to India: "This is an organized crime."

A computer user clicks on the 'wrong' site and suddenly they face a frozen screen, sometimes appearing glaring red with an alarming message that Microsoft Windows has detected a nasty virus and is isolating it, waiting to hear from you. The message warns, do nothing other than call Microsoft directly at the telephone number that appears on the screen. Do.not.shut.off.your.computer, it also warns. You call that number and a sympathetic, professional at Microsoft confirms that your computer has been blocked.

However, the person you're speaking to explains that it can be unblocked, once again giving you access to all you hold dear and depend upon. All you have to do to get the gears going is provide them with the authorization to unblock your computer which can be done through purchase of services. It's up to you, dear computer-owner; want your computer back? ... Microsoft is offering a package of services; chose one of several, ranging in cost from $99 to $1,000 for the deluxe service and the problem is fixed.

If the suspicion crosses your mind that this doesn't sound like Microsoft, well you're right. It doesn't and it isn't, and you're being had. Shut down your computer, and it'll have to be an 'illegal' shut-down because remember, everything is frozen. Microsoft will indeed do the rest. The system will evaluate itself and automate Microsoft's protective services to eliminate the threat and restore your system. Panic gone. All's right with the world. You've done the right thing.

Many, however have not. The scam works among many who allow themselves to be completely fazed and discombobulated by this surprise; a wholly unexpected intrusion into the inner sanctum of their computer. The alert that appeared so genuine wasn't, but you have the 'proof' in your disabled computer and the panic-anxiety that leads you to agree to their terms that will restore it to you -- and you've been successfully victimized.

One in five recipients of that viral threat will fall victim to a fake tech-support center while six percent among them will end up paying the extortion to "fix" the problem that really doesn't exist, as far as a recent consumer survey undertaken by Microsoft attests. Microsoft receives about 11,000 complaints about the scams monthly. Its own Internet monitors spot some 150,000 pop-up ads for the services on a daily basis.

Working with Microsoft, law enforcement authorities traced many of these boiler room enterprises to New Delhi, the capital of India where last month police from two Delhi suburbs raided sixteen fake tech-support centers, arresting over 30 people. In similar raids on ten call centers, authorities arrested another 24 people back in October. Fifty police officers swooped down on eight centers on November 28 in one of those suburbs where scammers had extracted money from thousands, mostly Americans and Canadians.

Posing as a Microsoft employee, an operator responding to a victim's contacting the call center would inform the caller their system had been hacked or attacked by a virus, most unfortunately. That's when the package of services to solve the problem would be proffered. U.S. authorities have busted similar scams in the United States, but the majority of such illicit centers come out of India reflecting the country's experience in operating many of the world's call centers where about 1.2 million people are employed generating about $28-billion in annual revenues.