The U.S. Federal Trade Commission is demanding documents from OpenAI as part of a probe into whether the company’s conversational AI tool ChatGPT harms consumers, according to a report first published by the Washington Post.
The investigation reportedly will examine whether ChatGPT violates consumer protection laws for inadequately safeguarding users’ data.
FTC Chair Lina Khan, who was scheduled to testify before Congress Thursday, has been a vocal critic of the popular AI chatbot.
The probe comes after congressional hearings in May, during which OpenAI Chief Executive Sam Altman testified and called for more regulation and independent audits of artificial intelligence.
“I think if this technology goes wrong, it can go quite wrong … we want to be vocal about that,” Altman said. “We want to work with the government to prevent that from happening.”
In March, the Center for Artificial Intelligence and Digital Policy, a prominent tech ethics group filed a complaint with the FTC. The group requested an investigation into the fast-developing technology and called for a pause in the training of AI models for six months to “ensure the establishment of necessary guardrails to protect consumers, businesses, and the commercial marketplace.”
“What we need them to do is enjoin OpenAI to prevent further releases of GPT until adequate safeguards are available,” said Marc Rotenberg, the center’s leader and longtime privacy advocate.
Federal legislation surrounding artificial intelligence has lagged behind the technology’s production in Silicon Valley.
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