White House AI Memo Addresses Importance of Protecting Tech From Adversaries
The White House this week issued a memorandum on advancing U.S. leadership in artificial intelligence, directing federal agencies to take “concrete and impactful steps” to make sure the U.S. remains at the forefront of AI development and that the technology helps instead of harms national security. The memo calls on the Commerce Department, the State Department, the Office of Science and Technology Policy and other agencies to “improve the security and diversity of chip supply chains,” according to a fact sheet, and to protect advanced AI technologies from foreign theft.
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“Our competitors want to upend U.S. AI leadership and have employed economic and technological espionage in efforts to steal U.S. technology,” the fact sheet said. The memo “makes collection on our competitors’ operations against our AI sector a top-tier intelligence priority” and directs U.S. agencies to give AI developers “the timely cybersecurity and counterintelligence information necessary to keep their inventions secure.”
The memo doesn’t explicitly mention export controls, though a senior administration official told reporters Oct. 23 that the language was crafted with those controls in mind. The memo addresses “the importance of protecting advanced AI technologies so that they’re not used against us by adversary militaries or intelligence services,” the official said. “And so, at a high level, it does kind of try to emphasize the importance of maintaining those policies and making sure that we are continuously adapting to efforts to circumvent those measures.”
The official stressed that they were referring to controls not only over graphics processing units (GPUS) -- the advanced chips that can be used for AI applications -- “but also the semiconductor manufacturing equipment that’s necessary to manufacture those” chips. “So, that full aspect of the supply chain,” the official said.
The memo warns about the risks of not taking enough steps to protect and harness AI. If the U.S. government doesn’t “act with responsible speed and in partnership with industry, civil society, and academia to make use of AI capabilities in service of the national security mission -- and to ensure the safety, security, and trustworthiness of American AI innovation writ large -- it risks losing ground to strategic competitors,” it said. “Ceding the United States’ technological edge would not only greatly harm American national security, but it would also undermine United States foreign policy objectives and erode safety, human rights, and democratic norms worldwide.”