Biden Administration adopts rules to guide A.I.’s global spread
The Biden administration released sweeping rules Monday that govern how A.I. The Biden administration said that the rules were necessary to keep A.I. The new rules have been protested by tech companies, who claim they will threaten their future sales and the prospects of American tech. The rules limit the number of A.I. chips that can be sent to each country, effectively dividing the globe into three categories. The United States, Canada, Germany and the 18 closest allies — Britain, Canada and South Korea — are exempt from restrictions and may purchase A.I. chips freely.
Countries that are already subject to U.S. arms embargoes, like China and Russia, will continue to face a previously existing ban on A.I. chip purchases.
All other nations — most of the world — will be subject to caps restricting the number of A.I. The number of chips that can imported is limited, but countries and companies may increase this number through special agreements with the U.S. Government. These rules may be a source of irritation for some foreign governments. Even those who are close allies or trading partners of the United States will have restrictions placed on their ability purchase more American A.I. The rules aim to stop China from obtaining the technology needed to produce artificial intelligent from other countries, after the United States prohibited such sales to China recently. models within the borders of the United States and its partners.
Governments around the world, particularly in the Middle East, have been pumping money into attracting and building enormous data centers, in a bid to become the next center for A.I. development.
Jake Sullivan, President Biden’s national security adviser, told reporters on Sunday that the rule would ensure that the infrastructure for training the most advanced artificial intelligence would be in the United States or in the jurisdiction of close allies, and “that capacity does not get offshored like chips and batteries and other industries that we’ve had to invest hundreds of billion dollars to bring back onshore.”
Mr. Mr. Sullivan stated that the rule will provide “greater transparency to our international partners, and to industry” while countering the national security threats of malicious actors who could use “American technology against us.” On Sunday, Biden administration officials told reporters that the rules were bipartisan and they had consulted with the incoming Trump administration on them. The global market for semiconductors, and in particular Nvidia, is dominated by U.S. firms. The U.S. government can regulate A.I. technology by restricting exports from U.S. companies. technology worldwide, by restricting U.S. company exports.
Companies have protested those limitations, saying the restrictions could hamper innocuous or even beneficial types of computing, anger U.S. allies and ultimately push global buyers into buying non-American products, like those made by China.
In a statement, Ned Finkle, Nvidia’s vice president for government affairs, called the rule “unprecedented and misguided” and said it “threatens to derail innovation and economic growth worldwide.”
“Rather than mitigate any threat, the new Biden rules would only weaken America’s global competitiveness, undermining the innovation that has kept the U.S. ahead,” he said. Nvidia’s stock dipped nearly 3 percent in premarket trading on Monday.
Brad Smith, the president of Microsoft, said in a statement that the company was confident it could “comply fully with this rule’s high security standards and meet the technology needs of countries and customers around the world that rely on us.”
In a letter to Congressional leadership on Sunday that was viewed by The New York Times, Jason Oxman, the president of the Information Technology Industry Council, a group representing tech companies, asked Congress to step in and use its authority to overturn the action if the Trump administration did not.
John Neuffer, the president of the Semiconductor Industry Association, said his group was “deeply disappointed that a policy shift of this magnitude and impact is being rushed out the door days before a presidential transition and without any meaningful input from industry.”
“The stakes are high, and the timing is fraught,” Mr. Neuffer added.
The rules, which run more than 200 pages, also set up a system in which companies that operate data centers, like Microsoft and Google, can apply for special government accreditations.
In return for following certain security standards, these companies can then trade in A.I. Nvidia’s stock fell nearly 3 percent in premarket trading on Monday. Companies will have to agree that 75 percent of the total A.I. is to be kept in-house. The rules set the first limits on the weighting of A.I. Models, which are the parameters that make each AI model unique and determine its ability to predict. Companies setting up data centers abroad will be required to adopt security standards to protect this intellectual property and prevent adversaries from gaining access to them.
Governments facing restrictions can raise the number of A.I. The Biden administration may issue new rules on chips and A.I. People familiar with the Biden administration’s deliberations say that the administration could issue more rules related to chips and A.I. The Biden administration has issued a number of new regulations to combat China’s technological advancement. The administration has issued new limits on exports of chip-making equipment to China and other countries, proposed new restrictions on Chinese drones, added new Chinese companies to a military blacklist, and hurried to finalize new subsidies for U.S. chip manufacturing.
But the A.I. The regulations that were issued on Monday seem to be the most comprehensive and significant of all these actions. Artificial intelligence has a profound impact on how scientists conduct research, companies assign tasks to their employees, and militaries function. A.I. has many beneficial uses, but U.S. officials are increasingly concerned that it could enable the development of new weapons, help countries surveil dissidents and otherwise upend the global balance of power. Jimmy Goodrich, senior adviser for technology at RAND Corporation, says the rules will create a framework to protect U.S. national security interests, while still allowing companies to compete overseas. He said that the rules are forward-looking and are designed to protect U.S. security interests while still allowing firms to compete abroad.
