2023-07-14 03:24:23
The US Federal Trade Commission is investigating the company OpenAI to determine whether its popular ChatGPT application harms consumers by generating false information and whether its technology misuses user data.
Microsoft-backed OpenAI was notified of the probe in a 20-page questionnaire, which asks the company to describe incidents in which users were falsely defamed and share the company’s efforts to ensure they don’t come back. to happen.
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The US regulator’s investigation was first reported by The Washington Post.
OpenAI’s launch of ChatGPT last November stunned the world by showcasing the power of large language models (or LLMs), a form of artificial intelligence (AI) known as “generative AI” that can produce content similar to that created by humans in seconds.
Amid the uproar over the technology’s capabilities, authorities received reports that these models could also generate offensive, false or just plain weird content, sometimes called “hallucinations.”
Commerce Commission Chair Lina Khan addressed a congressional committee hearing on Wednesday and, while she did not mention the investigation, told lawmakers her agency had concerns about ChatGPT’s potentially defamatory output.
“We’ve heard of reports where people’s sensitive information appears in response to someone else’s question,” Khan said.
“We’ve heard of slander, defamatory statements, totally untrue things that are coming up. That is the type of fraud and deception we are concerned about,” he added.
The regulator’s investigation focuses on how this aspect could harm users, according to the questionnaire, but also delves into OpenAI’s use of private data to build its world-leading model.
The company’s GPT-4 is the base technology behind ChatGPT, as well as dozens of other programs from companies that pay OpenAI a fee to access its model for their own uses.
In a tweet, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman lamented that news about the research was leaked to the media, which “does not build trust.”
He added that “of course” OpenAI will cooperate with the Federal Trade Commission and assured that it is “very important to us that our technology is safe and consumer-friendly, and we are confident in complying with the law.”
If the regulator perceives illegal or unsafe practices, it will require corrective action and possibly file a lawsuit.
OpenAI and the Trade Commission did not respond to a request for comment.
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