Pentagon's Emil Michael says export controls can rein in AI labs that don't cooperate
Emil Michael, a senior Defense Department official and a vice chair of the White House's Super Intelligence Force, told The Information in a video interview that the executive branch can use tools including export controls to check AI companies that don't cooperate with the government, citing past limits on exporting encryption and enforcement by the Justice Department. He likened frontier labs that call for regulation to a drunk driver asking to be pulled over, and said existing laws are “more than sufficient.” Michael also said the government had already acted: according to his account, Anthropic refused to withdraw a model after the government found it was jailbroken, and within two hours the company was under export controls. He said the Pentagon has labeled Anthropic a supply chain risk, and that there is no discussion about working with the company at the department unless it changes its stance on models having control over humans. He said about 1.7 million of the department's 3.5 million employees now use AI, up from 80,000 a year earlier.
Michael is one of four senior officials leading the White House's Super Intelligence Force and is charged with liaising with AI companies and developing protocols for handling cyber breaches, hacks and other critical incidents; he has publicly described export controls as a tool to check AI companies that do not cooperate with the government.
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