Italy has taken a step to put a fence on artificial intelligence. At the height of this technology, Rome has blocked this Friday, “with immediate effect” the ChatGPT tool, the intelligent chatbot capable of simulating and processing human conversations and belonging to the American technology company OpenAI, which the transalpine country accuses of not respect the consumer data protection law. The suspension will be lifted when you demonstrate that you comply with Italian privacy regulations.
The Italian Guarantor for the Protection of Personal Data, an independent administrative authority that ensures the protection of user and consumer data, considers that the platform collects user data illegally and has opened an investigation to clarify the precise operation of the platform. this tool and determine if you have committed a violation.
The Italian body ensures that this chat, the best known of the emerging generative artificial intelligence, suffered a data loss (or data breach) on March 20 about its users and the conversations they have with the machine and payment information of your subscribers.
The Italian Guarantor has criticized, through a statement, “the lack of information for users and all interested parties” about the process of collecting and managing private data on the platform. And it denounces “the absence of a legal basis that justifies the massive collection and storage of personal data in order to ‘train’ the algorithms that manage the operation of the platform”.
The Italian authority alleges, based on “the checks carried out” that the information provided by ChatGPT “does not always correspond to the real data”, which according to the guarantor “results in inaccurate processing of personal data”.
Finally, Italy regrets “the absence of any type of filter” in the verification of the age of its users, despite the fact that the service is aimed at people over 13 years of age. And it condemns “the exposure of minors to totally inadequate responses with respect to their level of development and self-awareness.”
Italy has asked OpenAI to communicate within 20 days the measures taken to comply with the Guarantor’s request or, otherwise, it may face a penalty of up to 20 million euros or up to 4% of annual turnover. global.
Guido Scorza, board member of the data protection authority, censored in an interview with the newspaper La Repubblica “the lack of information on the treatment of personal data of users” offered by the American company. And he has spoken about the risks that this type of tool entails: “With ChatGPT and the chatbot we have conversations, and in these conversations we often tend to share much of our lives. You can ask when Paolo Rossi was born and get an answer. This is personal data. Every question about people’s lives is a data processing. Not to mention the ones he treats wrongly, ”he indicates. And he gives an example: “If I ask the chatbot when Guido Scorza joined the College of Privacy Guarantors, he tells me that in 2016. But I joined in 2020. In addition to illegal data processing, it is the case that the processing is inaccurate in many cases.
Scorza assures that Italy has acted autonomously, because OpenAI is not based in Europe, so it is outside the EU cooperation procedures, but it sponsors “a debate at the European level to see if it is possible to cooperate and act together and as”.
The use of artificial intelligence is becoming more frequent and for this reason UNESCO has urged countries to apply “without delay” the Global Ethical Framework on this technology, which the 193 Member States unanimously adopted in 2021 and which contains guidelines to maximize the benefits of AI and reduce the risks it entails. “The world needs stricter ethical standards for artificial intelligence: this is the great challenge of our time,” he said. UNESCO Director General Audrey Azoulay.
A few days ago, the founder and billionaire owner of Tesla, Elon Musk, and more than 1,000 technology researchers, including, among others, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak; Jaan Tallinn, co-founder of Skype, as well as engineers from Meta or Microsoft called for a pause in the development of advanced artificial intelligence for at least six months. They point out that the aim is to stop what they have called “a dangerous race that is leading to the development of more unpredictable models and with ever greater capabilities.” “Artificial intelligence systems can pose a profound risk to society and humanity. Unfortunately, it is not being developed with the proper level of planning and care,” they point out in their letter.
In the United States, several organizations have also called for the suspension of ChatGPT for being suspicious of these experiments with artificial intelligence.
