A bill supported by the California Faculty Association, which represents faculty and other academic employees across the CSU system, is moving through the Legislature and could soon reach Gov. Gavin Newsom. The measure is authored by state Sen. Sabrina Cervantes, a Riverside Democrat, giving the Inland Empire a direct role in one of California higher education’s most closely watched debates over artificial intelligence.

The proposal comes as the 23-campus CSU system, the nation’s largest public four-year university system, has expanded access to AI tools for students and employees. CSU campuses in Southern California and the Inland Empire, including Cal State San Bernardino, Cal Poly Pomona, Cal State Fullerton, Cal State Los Angeles and others, are part of the systemwide technology shift.

Faculty union leaders say they are not trying to stop professors from using AI in classrooms or research. Their concern is that, without clear rules, campuses could begin using AI to perform work traditionally done by faculty and staff.

“We do have some cases of the potential replacement of faculty work by AI, and so I personally am very concerned about closing the barn door after the horse has already gotten out,” said Kevin Wehr, a Sacramento State sociology professor who leads the union’s bargaining team. “We’re trying to keep ahead of a rapidly changing set of technologies.”

The CSU system last year signed a $17 million agreement with OpenAI to give students and faculty access to ChatGPT education tools. The system later renewed the contract at $13 million a year for three years, according to LAist.

A CSU survey released in the spring found that slightly more than half of faculty members said AI was having a negative effect on their teaching. About one-third of students said their professors were teaching them how to use AI effectively.

CSU has also been identified in a state government report as using “high risk” AI tools, including software intended to detect cheating during remote exams.

The growing use of AI has already prompted labor disputes. The state labor relations board is scheduled to consider issues tied to CSU’s purchase and rollout of AI tools such as ChatGPT. The California Faculty Association filed an unfair labor practice charge last year, arguing that the university system’s AI initiative raised workplace issues that should have been negotiated with the union.

A separate dispute centered on Sacramento State, where the union alleged in 2025 that campus officials considered using AI chatbots that could draw from course materials voluntarily submitted by professors. CSU denied wrongdoing.

The union also challenged a proposed recommendation that students seek mental health support from AI tools when campus counselors were unavailable.

CSU and the union settled that matter in March, and the union withdrew its complaint. As part of the agreement, Sacramento State said it would not implement autonomous programs or bots whose primary purpose is to perform bargaining unit work or evaluate faculty without first meeting and conferring with the union.

At a June legislative hearing, Cervantes said colleges and universities are increasingly experimenting with AI, often without clear standards.

“Many institutions of higher education are exploring options to integrate AI into their courses and curriculum,” Cervantes said. “In many instances, this has been done without any boundaries or guardrails.”

The California Faculty Association represents professors, lecturers, coaches, librarians and mental health counselors. Since 2020, the union has contributed at least $3.4 million to state legislators and candidates for statewide office. Cervantes has received at least $64,650 from the union since 2016, according to Digital Democracy, a government disclosure tool operated by CalMatters.

CSU has not taken a position on Cervantes’ bill. But AI remains an issue in ongoing labor contract talks between the university system and the faculty union.

The Sacramento State dispute illustrates the broader tension. Union filings alleged that Alexander “Sasha” Sidorkin, then the campus’s chief AI officer, created a mental health chatbot for students and linked to it on a student resources webpage with a statement suggesting AI was better than no help when a counselor was unavailable.

CSU’s chancellor’s office replied to the labor board that the allegations were unfounded. The university said Sidorkin did not create such bots and that no AI bots were implemented to perform counseling work.

Sidorkin, who remains at Sacramento State as an education professor and is a union member, said the allegation was inaccurate. He said he did not create a bot but recommended that students use ChatGPT if they could not find a counselor. He said he still believes students should be told in a syllabus that an AI tool may be preferable to having no support at all during a mental health episode.

Sidorkin said Sacramento State eliminated the chief AI officer position last April during systemwide layoffs and removed the website connected with the role.

The union also alleged that Sidorkin created an AI tool to interpret the faculty union’s contract with CSU and that the tool produced incorrect information. The complaint said CSU stopped using the contract interpretation bot after the union objected.

Another concern involved course materials. According to the union complaint, Sidorkin invited faculty to submit syllabi and class content so they could receive customized AI tutoring bots for their courses. The complaint included an email in which Sidorkin told faculty that campus leaders had directed him to retract the request, though he appeared to disagree with the decision.

Sidorkin told CalMatters that about 18 professors sent him course materials the first day he invited submissions. He said filing the labor charges was a mistake and argued that many faculty members are already experimenting with AI tools to support teaching.

Patrick Oberle, an associate professor of geography at Sacramento State and a union member, said the faculty association became involved because AI could affect work performed by faculty and counselors. He said the concern is not simply whether technology is useful, but whether it could be deployed without bargaining over its impact on employees.

Oberle said faculty worry about “mission creep,” such as campuses encouraging instructors to shift more grading work to AI and then increasing class sizes. That has not happened formally, he said, but union members fear it could reduce student contact with instructors and lessen the need to hire faculty as others retire.

“We’re trying to accommodate the folks who are deeply opposed to AI’s very existence, and also accommodate the folks that are very excited about all of its possibilities,” Oberle said.

Cervantes’ bill is one of several AI-related labor measures moving through Sacramento. Senate Bill 947 would stop employers from relying solely on AI tools to discipline or fire workers. Labor unions and some nonprofit groups support the bill, while business groups including the California Chamber of Commerce and Lyft oppose it. Newsom vetoed a similar proposal last year.

Another proposal, Senate Bill 903, would restrict the use of AI in psychotherapy, including banning therapists from offering therapy through chatbots and prohibiting bots from making independent therapeutic decisions. The California Chamber of Commerce and the California Medical Association oppose that bill.

During the hearing on Cervantes’ CSU faculty bill, Assemblymember Mike Fong, an Alhambra Democrat who chairs the Assembly Higher Education Committee, said AI should assist people, not displace them.

“We know technology can augment humans, but it should never replace humans,” Fong said.

The committee then voted 10-0 to advance the measure.

Original source: CalMatters

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The decision, reached earlier this month, made Monterey Park the first city in the United States to prohibit data centers outright. The vote followed months of neighborhood opposition to a proposed facility that drew protests, lawn signs and public pressure on City Hall.

In March, the Monterey Park City Council voted unanimously to send the ban to voters while also extending a temporary moratorium on data centers. Within weeks, the developer behind the proposed project withdrew its plans.

Mayor Elizabeth Yang said residents who campaigned against the project were pleased with the outcome after months of organizing.

“They spent a lot of time door knocking, putting up signs, fundraising, campaigning,” Yang said. “So it was a lot of community effort.”

The Monterey Park vote comes as communities across California and the country weigh the economic promise of data centers against concerns about power consumption, water use, noise and environmental impacts. A March Gallup poll found that 7 in 10 Americans surveyed opposed having data centers built in their area.

Industry representatives, however, warn that bans could discourage investment. Khara Boender, director of state policy for the Data Center Coalition, said Monterey Park’s decision sends a message that the area is “closed for business.”

Data centers are the physical backbone of cloud computing and artificial intelligence systems, housing servers that process and store enormous amounts of digital information. California already has at least 287 such facilities, according to the Data Center Coalition. The group says data centers supported more than 665,000 jobs in the state in 2024 and generated $14.1 billion in state and local taxes.

Major technology companies are also pouring unprecedented sums into the sector. Meta, Microsoft, Amazon and Alphabet are expected to spend a combined $700 billion on data centers worldwide by the end of this year.

Peter Leroe-Muñoz, senior vice president and general counsel for the Bay Area Council, argued that communities risk cutting themselves off from the infrastructure needed for modern business, research and innovation.

“Data centers make modern lives possible,” he said, calling them a platform for “play, productivity and potential” in the current economy.

Still, Monterey Park is not alone in taking a cautious approach. Local governments around California are considering how to regulate the industry as demand for AI-related infrastructure grows.

In Imperial County, supervisors are weighing a temporary moratorium on data center projects after residents criticized the county for moving forward with a proposed facility. In San Jose, where at least 40 data centers already operate, the City Council recently directed the city manager to draft new guidelines for future projects. Some critics remain wary, especially after the city last year promoted a partnership with Pacific Gas & Electric intended to streamline data center development.

For Southern California communities watching the rapid expansion of AI infrastructure, Monterey Park’s vote may serve as a test case for how far local governments are willing to go in pushing back against one of the technology industry’s fastest-growing sectors.

Original source: CalMatters

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In 2024, Kaiser announced it was rolling out Abridge, an AI-powered clinical documentation system the health system described as “ambient listening technology.” The tool is intended to help doctors and other clinicians, including mental health providers, generate clinical notes during appointments.

But some Kaiser therapists and social workers say the public description does not fully convey what happens during visits: The tool records entire appointments, including mental health sessions where patients may discuss trauma, family conflict, substance use, medical diagnoses or other deeply personal matters.

Clinicians are required to obtain patient consent before using Abridge, according to Kaiser. However, multiple providers say the consent process does not clearly explain how the recordings are stored, how long they are kept, who can access them or how the data may be used. Some say they have asked Kaiser leadership for those details and have not received adequate answers.

Ilana Marcucci-Morris, a licensed clinical social worker in Kaiser’s psychiatry department in Oakland, said she has chosen not to use Abridge with her patients. Marcucci-Morris also serves on a bargaining committee and said she has repeatedly raised questions with Kaiser representatives about privacy protections, HIPAA compliance and safeguards for AI tools.

She said the responses have amounted to assurances that the system is compliant and has been reviewed by technology experts, without providing the documentation clinicians have requested.

“They won’t show us,” Marcucci-Morris said in an interview with American Community Media. “If you have nothing to hide and you’re doing it ethically, then you would show us, prove it.”

Similar concerns have surfaced in Southern California. Ligia Pacheco, a psychiatric social worker who provides remote therapy services for Kaiser patients in the region, said she also sought more information about Abridge and did not receive the explanations she believes providers need to properly inform patients.

Pacheco said a colleague who raised concerns to a supervisor was told that expressing personal views about AI in the workplace was unprofessional. She said that kind of response makes providers feel they have little room to advocate for patients.

“We’re supposed to be the voice of patients who are coming in their most vulnerable state,” Pacheco said. “And we can’t even be that voice for them, so we feel discouraged.”

The dispute comes as many mental health professionals say they are facing rising workloads and heavy documentation demands. Marcucci-Morris said clinicians may see patient after patient with little time between appointments, making it difficult to keep up with notes and other administrative tasks.

She said providers who fall behind can face workplace investigations or discipline, and that management often recommends Abridge as a way to reduce delays in documentation. In her view, that creates pressure on clinicians to use the technology even if they have unanswered concerns.

“I consider that to be coercive,” she said, “because you’re putting someone in a position to either lose their job or use the software.”

Kaiser has promoted the tool as a way to reduce administrative burdens and improve the patient experience. In a Kaiser news release, Brian Hoberman, chief information officer for The Permanente Medical Group, said Abridge helps support physician well-being by easing documentation demands. He said the technology was implemented after careful review and testing and had been well received by patients and doctors.

A Kaiser Permanente spokesperson said in an emailed statement to American Community Media that clinicians must obtain consent before using Abridge and that “no one is recorded without their knowledge and consent.” The statement said recordings are stored for no more than 14 days and that processing of the data meets HIPAA requirements as well as Kaiser’s privacy and security standards.

The spokesperson also said Abridge allows clinicians to spend more time focused on patients and less time on administrative work. Kaiser says data collected through the tool is not used to train AI models.

Still, some patients and providers remain uneasy, especially when the appointment involves mental health care. One Kaiser patient, who asked not to be named because of privacy concerns, said they feared intimate conversations with doctors or therapists could somehow be exposed.

“I may not want my employers, I may not want my family members, I might not want people to know some of these very intimate conversations and deep conversations I have with my doctors [and] with my mental health provider,” the patient said.

Adriana Webb, a social worker at Kaiser Panorama City in Los Angeles, said the concern is especially serious for patients with highly sensitive medical conditions.

“I work with patients who have sensitive medical diagnoses, like HIV and AIDS,” Webb said, adding that some patients do not even want those diagnoses documented in their charts.

Privacy experts say mental health information carries a particular risk because of the stigma and consequences patients may face if details are disclosed or misused. Nicole Alvarez, senior analyst for technology policy at the Center for American Progress, said records of a person’s most vulnerable moments can be used against them in ways that routine medical information, such as a blood pressure reading, generally cannot.

Alvarez said mental health records may affect employment, child custody disputes, immigration proceedings, security clearances and personal relationships. She said health systems should be clear with patients about how their information is stored, shared and used.

Agreements between health care providers and AI vendors can differ significantly, Alvarez said. Key questions include whether recordings or transcripts can be used to train AI models, whether data is de-identified, how long it is retained, whether it can be shared with other entities and what happens when a vendor contract ends.

Patients often have little visibility into those arrangements, she said. While most patients have the right to refuse recordings, Alvarez said the option to decline is not always presented clearly. In some cases, consent may be requested directly; in others, information may be included in intake paperwork that patients may not closely read.

Meaningful consent, she said, requires more than simply informing patients that a recording will occur. Patients should understand that they can say no and should be told what will happen to their information afterward.

Pacheco said she encountered the issue during her own appointment at Kaiser. She said her doctor did not ask whether Abridge could be used but instead told her it would be used. After a pause, she declined. The doctor stopped the recording, she said, but she felt a noticeable change in the doctor’s demeanor afterward. Pacheco later changed doctors.

Marcucci-Morris said she worries that patients may feel pressured to agree when the tool is framed as something that helps doctors avoid burnout, complete paperwork and spend more time with their families. Patients who care about their clinicians, she said, may feel guilty refusing.

Kaiser has said Abridge is available in 40 hospitals and more than 600 medical offices in eight states and the District of Columbia. The tool operates in more than 14 languages and is part of a broader push by the health care industry to adopt AI systems for clinical support and documentation.

American Community Media said it contacted Abridge AI Inc. multiple times for comment but received no response. On its website, Abridge describes itself as a “Business Associate” to health care providers and directs patients to consult their providers’ privacy policies for information on how their data is protected.

For Marcucci-Morris, the central concern is the relationship between patient and therapist. She said privacy and trust are essential to effective care and that recording a session can alter the dynamic.

“Therapy is most effective in privacy and when trust is achieved through two human beings,” she said. “I believe recording a therapy session changes human behavior. It changes the patient’s demeanor.”

Original source: CalMatters

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A new report from the California Department of Technology identifies six “high-risk automated decision systems” currently in use by state agencies. The systems are used for purposes that include estimating whether incarcerated people may reoffend, screening unemployment claims for possible fraud, administering remote exams for California State University students and detecting whether students used generative artificial intelligence to complete assignments.

The findings were released Friday as part of an annual disclosure required under a 2023 state law. The law requires state agencies to report automated systems that assist or replace human judgment in decisions with legal or similarly significant consequences. That includes decisions affecting housing, education, employment, credit, health care and criminal justice.

The disclosure marks a significant shift from the state’s first report last year, when officials said they had no such systems in use. That answer drew scrutiny because some state agencies were already known to be using automated tools in sensitive areas.

Among the systems identified in the new report is COMPAS, a tool used by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to assign recidivism risk scores to incarcerated people. The department has used the system for at least a decade, according to previous state records.

Another system involves the Employment Development Department’s use of automated fraud detection in unemployment claims. The department’s fraud screening came under criticism after benefits for about 600,000 Californians were paused between Christmas and New Year’s in 2020, according to a Legislative Analyst’s Office report.

Civil rights, privacy and civil liberties organizations pushed for the 2023 reporting law because of concerns that automated systems, including artificial intelligence tools, can reproduce or worsen bias. Similar technologies have faced criticism nationally for alleged problems in high-stakes testing, criminal justice risk assessments and tools that claim to detect AI-generated writing.

The Department of Technology said this year’s inventory found more systems because officials conducted a more detailed review of agency responses. The department said it followed up with agencies and asked additional questions about how their tools are used.

In addition to the six systems deemed high risk, the report lists six other automated tools that were initially flagged but later determined not to meet the law’s high-risk definition. One of those was an AI tool used by the California Department of Finance to analyze legislative bills.

The report also identifies two high-risk systems that are not currently active. The Department of Cannabis Control is developing artificial intelligence to review whether cannabis packaging violates rules meant to prevent marketing that appeals to children. California State University, meanwhile, discontinued use of a language model that had been used to review job applications.

The new disclosure comes as public agencies across California are beginning to catalog their use of AI. San Jose and San Francisco recently released their first AI inventories. At the same time, California-based AI companies, including OpenAI and Anthropic, are increasingly seeking government work as public debate intensifies over how the technology should be regulated.

Surveys have shown that many Californians remain wary of artificial intelligence. Polling by TechEquity and Carnegie California found that more Californians prioritize safety protections over rapid innovation. National polling has reflected similar concerns.

An effort in Sacramento to place more limits on automated decision-making stalled last month. Senate Bill 1248 would have barred state workers from using automated decision systems as the sole basis for making decisions, but the measure died during the Legislature’s appropriations process.

Despite the new report, major questions remain about how broadly AI is being used across state government.

The disclosure does not include several generative AI pilot programs supported by the governor’s office. Those projects include tools intended to help businesses file taxes, assist state employees working on homelessness and support a state AI assistant called Poppy. According to a state website, Poppy uses large language models, including Anthropic’s Claude, to help draft documents, research policy and build custom AI tools. The state says 67 departments provided input during the pilot phase, with a statewide rollout scheduled to begin next month.

Also absent from the report is a California State University contract with OpenAI to provide a version of ChatGPT. Research and surveys on AI use in schools have raised concerns that the technology can create problems as well as benefits in educational settings.

The reporting law also excludes some major public institutions, including the judicial branch and the University of California system. That leaves out areas where AI is already emerging. Recent reporting found that a majority of California’s roughly 60 courts have adopted policies on generative AI use. Courts in Los Angeles and Riverside counties have begun testing an AI tool designed to function like a clerk by drafting orders and preparing legal research memos.

For Inland Empire residents, the issue is not abstract. Automated systems are increasingly being tested or used in areas that can touch daily life, from public benefits and college coursework to courts and corrections. The state’s latest report offers a broader look at those tools than last year’s disclosure, but it also shows that California’s accounting of government AI use remains incomplete.

Original source: CalMatters

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LONDON (AP) — Chatbots like ChatGPT wowed the world with their ability to write speeches, plan vacations or hold a conversation as good as or arguably even better than humans do, thanks to cutting-edge artificial intelligence systems. Now, frontier AI has become the latest buzzword as concerns grow that the emerging technology has capabilities that could endanger humanity.

Everyone from the British government to top researchers and even major AI companies themselves are raising the alarm about frontier AI’s as-yet-unknown dangers and calling for safeguards to protect people from its existential threats.

The debate comes to a head Wednesday, when British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak hosts a two-day summit focused on frontier AI. It’s reportedly expected to draw a group of about 100 officials from 28 countries, including U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and executives from key U.S. artificial intelligence companies including OpenAI, Google’s Deepmind and Anthropic.

The venue is Bletchley Park, a former top secret base for World War II codebreakers led by Alan Turing. The historic estate is seen as the birthplace of modern computing because it is where Turing and others famously cracked Nazi Germany’s codes using the world’s first digital programmable computer.

In a speech last week, Sunak said only governments — not AI companies — can keep people safe from the technology’s risks. However, he also noted that the U.K.’s approach “is not to rush to regulate,” even as he outlined a host of scary-sounding threats, such as the use of AI to more easily make chemical or biological weapons.

“We need to take this seriously, and we need to start focusing on trying to get ahead of the problem,” said Jeff Clune, an associate computer science professor at the University of British Columbia focusing on AI and machine learning.

Clune was among a group of influential researchers who authored a paper last week calling for governments to do more to manage risks from AI. It’s the latest in a series of dire warnings from tech moguls like Elon Musk and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman about the rapidly evolving technology and the disparate ways the industry, political leaders and researchers see the path forward when it comes to reining in the risks and regulation.

It’s far from certain that AI will wipe out mankind, Clune said, “but it has sufficient risk and chance of occurring. And we need to mobilize society’s attention to try to solve it now rather than wait for the worst-case scenario to happen.”

One of Sunak’s big goals is to find agreement on a communique about the nature of AI risks. He’s also unveiling plans for an AI Safety Institute that will evaluate and test new types of the technology and proposing creation of a global expert panel, inspired by the U.N. climate change panel, to understand AI and draw up a “State of AI Science” report.

The summit reflects the British government’s eagerness to host international gatherings to show it has not become isolated and can still lead on the world stage after its departure from the European Union three years ago.

The U.K. also wants to stake its claim in a hot-button policy issue where both the U.S. and the 27-nation EU are making moves.

Brussels is putting the final touches on what’s poised to be the world’s first comprehensive AI regulations, while U.S. President Joe Biden signed a sweeping executive order Monday to guide the development of AI, building on voluntary commitments made by tech companies.

China, which along with the U.S. is one of the two world AI powers, has been invited to the summit, though Sunak couldn’t say with “100% certainty” that representatives from Beijing will attend.

The paper signed by Clune and more than 20 other experts, including two dubbed the “godfathers” of AI — Geoffrey Hinton and Yoshua Bengio — called for governments and AI companies to take concrete action, such as by spending a third of their research and development resources on ensuring safe and ethical use of advanced autonomous AI.

Frontier AI is shorthand for the latest and most powerful systems that go right up to the edge of AI’s capabilities. They’re based on foundation models, which are algorithms trained on a broad range of information scraped from the internet to provide a general, but not infallible, base of knowledge.

That makes frontier AI systems “dangerous because they’re not perfectly knowledgeable,” Clune said. “People assume and think that they’re tremendously knowledgeable, and that can get you in trouble.”

The meeting, though, has faced criticism that it’s too preoccupied with far-off dangers.

“The focus of the summit is actually a bit too narrow,” said Francine Bennett, interim director of the Ada Lovelace Institute, a policy research group in London focusing on AI.

“We risk just forgetting about the broader set of risk and safety” and the algorithms that are already part of everyday life, she said at a Chatham House panel last week.

Deb Raji, a University of California, Berkeley, researcher who has studied algorithmic bias, pointed to problems with systems already deployed in the U.K., such as police facial recognition systems that had a much higher false detection rate for Black people and an algorithm that botched a high school exam.

The summit is a “missed opportunity” and marginalizes communities and workers that are most affected by AI, more than 100 civil society groups and experts said in an open letter to Sunak.

Skeptics say the U.K. government has set its summit goals too low, given that regulating AI will not be on the agenda, focusing instead on establishing “guardrails.”

Sunak’s call to not rush into regulation is reminiscent of “the messaging we hear from a lot of the corporate representatives in the U.S.,” Raji said. “And so I’m not surprised that it’s also making its way into what they might be saying to U.K. officials.”

Tech companies shouldn’t be involved in drafting regulations because they tend to “underestimate or downplay” the urgency and full range of harms, Raji said. They also aren’t so open to supporting proposed laws “that might be necessary but might effectively endanger their bottom line,” she said.

DeepMind and OpenAI didn’t respond to requests for comment. Anthropic said co-founders Dario Amodei and Jack Clark would be attending.

Microsoft said in a blog post that it looked forward “to the U.K.’s next steps in convening the summit, advancing its efforts on AI safety testing, and supporting greater international collaboration on AI governance.”

The government insists it will have the right mix of attendees from government, academia, civil society and business.

The Institute for Public Policy Research, a center-left U.K. think tank, said it would be a “historic mistake” if the tech industry was left to regulate itself without government supervision.

“Regulators and the public are largely in the dark about how AI is being deployed across the economy,” said Carsten Jung, the group’s senior economist. “But self-regulation didn’t work for social media companies, it didn’t work for the finance sector, and it won’t work for AI.”

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NEW YORK (AP) — The already-alarming proliferation of child sexual abuse images on the internet could become much worse if something is not done to put controls on artificial intelligence tools that generate deepfake photos, a watchdog agency warned on Tuesday.

In a written report, the U.K.-based Internet Watch Foundation urges governments and technology providers to act quickly before a flood of AI-generated images of child sexual abuse overwhelms law enforcement investigators and vastly expands the pool of potential victims.

“We’re not talking about the harm it might do,” said Dan Sexton, the watchdog group’s chief technology officer. “This is happening right now and it needs to be addressed right now.”

In a first-of-its-kind case in South Korea, a man was sentenced in September to 2 1/2 years in prison for using artificial intelligence to create 360 virtual child abuse images, according to the Busan District Court in the country’s southeast.

In some cases, kids are using these tools on each other. At a school in southwestern Spain, police have been investigating teens’ alleged use of a phone app to make their fully dressed schoolmates appear nude in photos.

The report exposes a dark side of the race to build generative AI systems that enable users to describe in words what they want to produce — from emails to novel artwork or videos — and have the system spit it out.

If it isn’t stopped, the flood of deepfake child sexual abuse images could bog investigators down trying to rescue children who turn out to be virtual characters. Perpetrators could also use the images to groom and coerce new victims.

Sexton said IWF analysts discovered faces of famous children online as well as a “massive demand for the creation of more images of children who’ve already been abused, possibly years ago.”

“They’re taking existing real content and using that to create new content of these victims,” he said. “That is just incredibly shocking.”

Sexton said his charity organization, which is focused on combating online child sexual abuse, first began fielding reports about abusive AI-generated imagery earlier this year. That led to an investigation into forums on the so-called dark web, a part of the internet hosted within an encrypted network and accessible only through tools that provide anonymity.

What IWF analysts found were abusers sharing tips and marveling about how easy it was to turn their home computers into factories for generating sexually explicit images of children of all ages. Some are also trading and attempting to profit off such images that appear increasingly lifelike.

“What we’re starting to see is this explosion of content,” Sexton said.

While the IWF’s report is meant to flag a growing problem more than offer prescriptions, it urges governments to strengthen laws to make it easier to combat AI-generated abuse. It particularly targets the European Union, where there’s a debate over surveillance measures that could automatically scan messaging apps for suspected images of child sexual abuse even if the images are not previously known to law enforcement.

A big focus of the group’s work is to prevent previous sex abuse victims from being abused again through the redistribution of their photos.

The report says technology providers could do more to make it harder for the products they’ve built to be used in this way, though it’s complicated by the fact that some of the tools are hard to put back in the bottle.

A crop of new AI image-generators was introduced last year and wowed the public with their ability to conjure up whimsical or photorealistic images on command. But most of them are not favored by producers of child sex abuse material because they contain mechanisms to block it.

Technology providers that have closed AI models, with full control over how they’re trained and used — for instance, OpenAI’s image-generator DALL-E — appear to have been more successful at blocking misuse, Sexton said.

By contrast, a tool favored by producers of child sex abuse imagery is the open-source Stable Diffusion, developed by London-based startup Stability AI. When Stable Diffusion burst onto the scene in the summer of 2022, a subset of users quickly learned how to use it to generate nudity and pornography. While most of that material depicted adults, it was often nonconsensual, such as when it was used to create celebrity-inspired nude pictures.

Stability later rolled out new filters that block unsafe and inappropriate content, and a license to use Stability’s software also comes with a ban on illegal uses.

In a statement released Tuesday, the company said it “strictly prohibits any misuse for illegal or immoral purposes” across its platforms. “We strongly support law enforcement efforts against those who misuse our products for illegal or nefarious purposes,” the statement reads.

Users can still access unfiltered older versions of Stable Diffusion, however, which are “overwhelmingly the software of choice … for people creating explicit content involving children,” said David Thiel, chief technologist of the Stanford Internet Observatory, another watchdog group studying the problem.

“You can’t regulate what people are doing on their computers, in their bedrooms. It’s not possible,” Sexton added. “So how do you get to the point where they can’t use openly available software to create harmful content like this?”

Most AI-generated child sexual abuse images would be considered illegal under existing laws in the U.S., U.K. and elsewhere, but it remains to be seen whether law enforcement has the tools to combat them.

The IWF’s report is timed ahead of a global AI safety gathering next week hosted by the British government that will include high-profile attendees including U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and tech leaders.

“While this report paints a bleak picture, I am optimistic,” IWF CEO Susie Hargreaves said in a prepared written statement. She said it is important to communicate the realities of the problem to “a wide audience because we need to have discussions about the darker side of this amazing technology.”

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NEW YORK (AP) — As concerns grow over increasingly powerful artificial intelligence systems like ChatGPT, the nation’s financial watchdog says it’s working to ensure that companies follow the law when they’re using AI.

Already, automated systems and algorithms help determine credit ratings, loan terms, bank account fees, and other aspects of our financial lives. AI also affects hiring, housing and working conditions.

Ben Winters, Senior Counsel for the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said a joint statement on enforcement released by federal agencies last month was a positive first step.

“There’s this narrative that AI is entirely unregulated, which is not really true,” he said. “They’re saying, ‘Just because you use AI to make a decision, that doesn’t mean you’re exempt from responsibility regarding the impacts of that decision. This is our opinion on this. We’re watching.’”

In the past year, the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau said it has fined banks over mismanaged automated systems that resulted in wrongful home foreclosures, car repossessions, and lost benefit payments, after the institutions relied on new technology and faulty algorithms.

There will be no “AI exemptions” to consumer protection, regulators say, pointing to these enforcement actions as examples.

Consumer Finance Protection Bureau Director Rohit Chopra said the agency has “already started some work to continue to muscle up internally when it comes to bringing on board data scientists, technologists and others to make sure we can confront these challenges” and that the agency is continuing to identify potentially illegal activity.

Representatives from the Federal Trade Commission, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and the Department of Justice, as well as the CFPB, all say they’re directing resources and staff to take aim at new tech and identify negative ways it could affect consumers’ lives.

“One of the things we’re trying to make crystal clear is that if companies don’t even understand how their AI is making decisions, they can’t really use it,” Chopra said. “In other cases, we’re looking at how our fair lending laws are being adhered to when it comes to the use of all of this data.”

Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act and Equal Credit Opportunity Act, for example, financial providers have a legal obligation to explain any adverse credit decision. Those regulations likewise apply to decisions made about housing and employment. Where AI make decisions in ways that are too opaque to explain, regulators say the algorithms shouldn’t be used.

“I think there was a sense that, ’Oh, let’s just give it to the robots and there will be no more discrimination,’” Chopra said. “I think the learning is that that actually isn’t true at all. In some ways the bias is built into the data.”

EEOC Chair Charlotte Burrows said there will be enforcement against AI hiring technology that screens out job applicants with disabilities, for example, as well as so-called “bossware” that illegally surveils workers.

Burrows also described ways that algorithms might dictate how and when employees can work in ways that would violate existing law.

“If you need a break because you have a disability or perhaps you’re pregnant, you need a break,” she said. “The algorithm doesn’t necessarily take into account that accommodation. Those are things that we are looking closely at … I want to be clear that while we recognize that the technology is evolving, the underlying message here is the laws still apply and we do have tools to enforce.”

OpenAI’s top lawyer, at a conference this month, suggested an industry-led approach to regulation.

“I think it first starts with trying to get to some kind of standards,” Jason Kwon, OpenAI’s general counsel, told a tech summit in Washington, DC, hosted by software industry group BSA. “Those could start with industry standards and some sort of coalescing around that. And decisions about whether or not to make those compulsory, and also then what’s the process for updating them, those things are probably fertile ground for more conversation.”

Sam Altman, the head of OpenAI, which makes ChatGPT, said government intervention “will be critical to mitigate the risks of increasingly powerful” AI systems, suggesting the formation of a U.S. or global agency to license and regulate the technology.

While there’s no immediate sign that Congress will craft sweeping new AI rules, as European lawmakers are doing, societal concerns brought Altman and other tech CEOs to the White House this month to answer hard questions about the implications of these tools.

Winters, of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said the agencies could do more to study and publish information on the relevant AI markets, how the industry is working, who the biggest players are, and how the information collected is being used — the way regulators have done in the past with new consumer finance products and technologies.

“The CFPB did a pretty good job on this with the ‘Buy Now, Pay Later’ companies,” he said. “There are so may parts of the AI ecosystem that are still so unknown. Publishing that information would go a long way.”

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As I have been a columnist for American Thinker since 2014, I have wondered what my future as a writer will be in the brave new work of AI and Chat GPT. Here are some thoughts and possible answers.

Chat GPT, or the Generative Pre-trained Transformer, is a powerful language model that has the ability to generate coherent and human-like text based on a given prompt. With its advanced natural language processing capabilities, Chat GPT has become an increasingly valuable tool for opinion writers, but like any tool, it comes with its share of pros and cons. In this essay, I will discuss the good, the bad, and the ugly of Chat GPT for opinion writers.

Let’s start with the good. One of the biggest benefits of Chat GPT for opinion writers is the speed and efficiency it offers. With Chat GPT, writers can generate large amounts of text in a short amount of time, allowing them to produce more content and meet tight deadlines. Additionally, Chat GPT can help writers generate ideas and overcome writer’s block by providing prompts and suggestions that can spark creativity and inspiration. Another advantage of Chat GPT is its ability to analyze and interpret large amounts of data, including social media posts, news articles, and other sources of information.

This allows writers to stay up-to-date on current events and trends and incorporate that information into their writing. Chat GPT can also be used to analyze public opinion on a particular topic, helping writers to better understand the perspectives and attitudes of their audience. However, with the good comes the bad. One of the biggest concerns with Chat GPT is the potential for bias and misinformation. Because Chat GPT is trained on large datasets that may contain biases, it can generate text that perpetuates those biases. Additionally, because it can generate text that sounds human-like, there is a risk that readers may mistake the generated text for actual human-written content, leading to the spread of misinformation. Another potential issue with Chat GPT is the impact it may have on the writing profession.

As more writers rely on Chat GPT to generate content, there is a risk that the quality of writing may suffer. In addition, the use of Chat GPT may lead to a decrease in demand for human writers, as businesses and publications may opt to use Chat GPT-generated content instead. Finally, let’s address the ugly. One of the biggest concerns with Chat GPT is the potential for misuse. Because Chat GPT can generate text that sounds human-like, it can be used to spread propaganda or misinformation on a large scale. Additionally, malicious actors could use Chat GPT to generate spam or phishing messages that appear legitimate, increasing the risk of cyber attacks and fraud.

Another potential issue is the impact Chat GPT may have on the mental health of writers. As Chat GPT becomes more prevalent in the writing profession, writers may feel pressured to use it to keep up with the competition, leading to burnout and other mental health issues. Additionally, the ease and speed with which Chat GPT can generate text may lead to a decrease in the satisfaction and fulfillment that comes from the writing process.

In conclusion, Chat GPT offers many benefits for opinion writers, including speed, efficiency, and the ability to analyze large amounts of data. However, it also comes with its share of risks and concerns, including the potential for bias and misinformation, a decrease in writing quality, and the risk of misuse. As the use of Chat GPT continues to grow, it is important for writers and consumers of content to remain aware of these risks and work to mitigate them. Ultimately, the success of Chat GPT as a tool for opinion writers will depend on how it is used and the measures taken to ensure its responsible and ethical use. Did I write the above essay or did Chat GPT create it? I asked Chat GPT specifically, “Using my writing style, can you write an 800-word essay on what chat GPT means for opinion writers, the good, the bad, and the ugly.”

For my writing style, I provided links to my publications over the past 9 months. Within about 10 seconds, Chat GPT generated the above essay. Despite asking for an 800-word essay, the cyber brain only wrote a 606-word piece. Is the writing in my “style”? Perhaps readers can weigh in on that question. Or the American Thinker editors who have read my many past articles. I presume I have a style, just as I do swinging a golf club or skiing down the mountain, although such “style” may not be readily apparent to me. The Chat GPT generated essay was well written and grammatically correct. I like to use quotes to back up my assertions, but Chat GPT did not provide any references.

I also enjoy a bit of sarcasm and snark while Chat GPT was more measured and polite. My paragraphs tend to be shorter although I could probably ask Chat GPT to write 2-3 sentence paragraphs and he/she/it would happily oblige. What are the preferred pronouns for Chat GPT? I asked that question and this was Chat GPT’s answer, “As an AI language model, I do not have a gender identity or personal preferences. You can refer to me using any pronouns you are comfortable with.” Too bad the US military doesn’t take such a sensible approach to gender pronouns. Most intriguing are the implications for writers. For those writing copy for advertisements or news articles, this might be an extinction event.

Why hire woke virtue signaling reporters, pay their wages and benefits, and listen to them complain about oppression and triggers, when you can ask Chat GPT to do the same work, faster, for free, and without extraneous melodrama? What does this mean for students writing papers or admissions essays? Can AI identify other AI? In other words, can a Chat GPT written essay be identified as such? What are the copyright implications? Who technically owns the portion above written not by me but by Chat GPT? How much editing is needed before the piece is no longer Chat GPT generated? Does the concept of student writing become meaningless? Can American Thinker fill its pages with articles written in the style of its cadre of writers, but written by Chat GPT? Will readers know the difference? Such automation is exciting but when everything is AI created, it’s like living in a world of processed food.

It may taste OK and be convenient, but is it nutritious and healthy? Will it even matter anymore? What about the downsides of AI? For writing, the product is as good as the programming. If Chat GPT’s input is primarily left leaning, its work product will be as well. Imagine if Chat GPT’s primary source of “knowledge” includes the fact that MAGA or Trump supporters are domestic terrorists? Or that white heterosexual Christians are enemies of the state. President Biden, in an October 2021 speech, claimed the 80 million Trump supporting Republicans are white supremacists.

Chat GPT could also learn this view of Republicans by reading the New York Times or watching CNN. If that is AI’s mindset, how will that influence its writing and recommendations or actions to make the work a better place? What if tasked with saving the world? An AI platform would logically want to eliminate the problem people. Without ethics, genocide is on the table for AI. Could an advanced AI 3D print an army of drones, robots, or nanobots programmed to exterminate “enemies of the state”? Creating an artificial “brain” that thinks millions of times faster than a human brain, but devoid of morals or ethics, is a recipe for disaster. Think about the damage a lone psychopath could do and expand that by orders of magnitude in speed and ability.

A recent article in Time, well worth reading, points out this existential and all too real danger, “If somebody builds a too-powerful AI, under present conditions, I expect that every single member of the human species and all biological life on Earth dies shortly thereafter.” We are left with many questions, as with any new technology. Suddenly The Matrix and other such movies are no longer science fiction but our new reality. Red pill or blue pill? Buckle up for this new genie we are now letting out of the bottle.

DISCLAIMER: The opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by the various author’s articles on this Opinion piece or elsewhere online or in the newspaper where we have articles with the header “COLUMN/EDITORIAL & OPINION” do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints or official policies of the Publisher, Editor, Reporters or anybody else in the Staff of the Hemet and San Jacinto Chronicle Newspaper.

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