OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is expected to testify before the US Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday.
It's likely to be a hearing with some fireworks, as the release of OpenAI's ChatGPT in November sparked talk of an "AI revolution." Talk quickly turned into both hype and fear. As companies and social media users touted AI's possibilities, some concerned tech executives called for a slowdown in AI's rapid development.
Altman, previously president of tech accelerator Y Combinator, has been affiliated with OpenAI since its founding in 2015. By 2020, he was the startup's CEO full-time. OpenAI has had a number of notable backers in its brief life, including Tesla (TSLA) CEO and Twitter owner Elon Musk, Amazon Web Services (AMZN), and most recently Microsoft (MSFT).
Microsoft, which first invested in OpenAI in 2019, has doubled-down on its investment in the company in recent months, riding on the success of ChatGPT by dropping an additional $10 billion on OpenAI in January. It's an investment that Microsoft has mostly been lauded for, bringing the legacy tech giant back into a standoff with Google parent Alphabet (GOOG, GOOGL) over the future of search.
Why DC is worried
However, as AI has been more public-facing, its problems and risks have been clearer than ever – misinformation, bias, and privacy concerns all immediately sprang to the fore as problems for not only individuals, but society as a whole.
Lawmakers have taken notice, even at the highest levels of government. For example, this month, the White House has been meeting with tech executives, including Altman, to discuss AI, and both President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris have been involved.
Additionally, SEC Chair Gary Gensler today expressed worries about AI and where it goes from here.
"AI already is being used for call centers, account openings, compliance programs, trading algorithms, sentiment analysis, robo-advisers, and brokerage apps. Such applications can bring benefits in market access, efficiency, and returns," he said. "[AI] also has the potential to heighten financial fragility as it could increase herding, interconnectedness, and expose regulatory gaps. Existing financial sector regulatory regimes — built in an earlier era of data analytics technology — are likely to fall short in addressing the systemic risks posed by broad adoption of deep learning and generative AI in finance."
Likewise, various members of Congress have expressed AI-related concerns, including Senators Richard Blumenthal and Josh Hawley, who will lead Tuesday's hearing.
“Artificial intelligence urgently needs rules and safeguards to address its immense promise and pitfalls,” said Blumenthal in a statement. “This hearing begins our subcommittee’s work in overseeing and illuminating AI’s advanced algorithms and powerful technology."
Hawley, also in a statement, added: “Artificial intelligence will be transformative in ways we can’t even imagine, with implications for Americans’ elections, jobs, and security. This hearing marks a critical first step towards understanding what Congress should do.”
These meetings and tomorrow's hearing inevitably link back to a key question — what should the regulation of AI look like? The answers won't be simple, and we're operating with few, if any, examples, former Google CEO and Chair Eric Schmidt recently told Yahoo Finance.
"At the moment, Europe is doing almost nothing in this space, so we don't really have any examples," Schmidt said. "They have a law which requires that the system be able to explain itself if it's used in something critical. By definition, these systems today can't explain themselves — by the way, nor could your teenager if you have a teenager."
The goal of Tuesday's hearing, ultimately, will likely be for Congress to step forward when it comes to answering some of these questions.
Allie Garfinkle is a Senior Tech Reporter at Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter at @agarfinks and on LinkedIn.
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