OpenAI CEO Sam Altman shared in a post on X this week that the company is teaming up with the U.S. AI Safety Institute and will give the government agency early access to its next major AI model for safety testing.
Altman described the plan as part of a larger new push for AI safety measures, which could significantly impact ChatGPT and other OpenAI products in the years ahead. It also might be part of a PR and policy push against critics who say OpenAI no longer prioritizes AI safety.
One big reason for the criticism is that OpenAI created and then largely dissolved an internal AI safety team. The disbanding led to the resignation of top executives at the company, like Jan Leike and Ilya Sutskever, both of whom were instrumental in the company’s early safety research efforts. Many other current and former employees publicly wondered if OpenAI had decided to ignore safety in favor of product development.
Another reason is highlighted in a note appended directly to Altman’s post. He mentions pledging to allocate 20% of its computing resources to safety research last year, but that allocation at the time was specifically for the same committee whose leaders left the company. Still, the deal with the government isn’t the only genuine change. Altman said OpenAI has now voided restrictive non-disparagement clauses that discouraged whistleblowing.
If the deal with the U.S. AI Safety Institute is a strategic move by OpenAI to regain trust, it is a significant one. The Institute operates under the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) within the Commerce Department. It has been working on developing standards and guidelines for AI safety and security and is already working with many major AI and tech firms like Microsoft, Google, Meta, Apple, and Nvidia.
OpenAI sharing early access to its forthcoming AI model will let the Institute conduct safety testing and evaluations before the public release. This move is intended to ensure that any potential risks are identified and mitigated early in the development process, aligning with the broader goals outlined in President Joe Biden’s AI executive order last year.
It’s not the only regulatory encouragement by OpenAI in recent days. The company endorsed the Senate’s new Future of Innovation Act, which would give the AI Safety Institute responsibility for creating federal regulations for AI safety. The obvious connection between pushing for the bill and making its models central to the Institute’s work could be seen as an attempt to unduly influence regulation or a more innocent broadstroke effort to up AI safety.
Both seem plausible, and OpenAI does have a similar partnership with the U.K.’s AI safety body. Then again, OpenAI has spent more than triple on lobbying in the first half of this year compared to all of last year.
Safe, Profitable, Both?
OpenAI’s partnership with the U.S. AI Safety Institute will likely be judged by just how safe the eventual models actually are and whether there are any real restrictions to make them safer. That’s where the real question lies for consumers. As AI becomes increasingly integrated into everyday life, the tension between safety and profitability might grow even as OpenAI and its rivals hope to get the public to trust them and their AI models.
A government agency stamp of approval would certainly help on the trust front, and OpenAI wouldn’t want other companies to get it before them. The involvement of an independent safety body in evaluating AI models before they are released could provide greater assurance that the tools they use are secure and reliable. Growing concerns around AI issues, like data privacy, bias, and deliberate misuse of AI, might be mitigated by the proactive approach. OpenAI’s lobbying and other efforts to make those rules favorable to itself could undermine that and the entire point of the AI Safety Institute if they’re not careful.