U.S. Senate Commerce Committee Advances Several Bipartisan AI Bills
The U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Technology has approved eight AI-related bills, which will advance to the Senate floor for a full vote. Several of these bills target AI deepfakes and aim to increase the transparency and safety of AI systems. The list includes the following: the Validation and Evaluation for Trustworthy (VET) AI Act; the Future of AI Innovation Act; the National Science Foundation (NSF) AI Education Act; the Creating Resources for Every American To Experiment with AI (CREATE AI) Act; the AI Research, Innovation, and Accountability Act; the Testing and Evaluation Systems for Trusted (TEST) AI Act; the Small Business AI Training Act; and the Artificial Intelligence Public Awareness and Education Campaign Act.
U.S. Senators Introduce Bill to Protect Voice and Visual Likeness From AI-Generated Replicas
U.S. Senators Chris Coons (D-DE), Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), and Thom Tillis (R-NC) have introduced the Nurture Originals, Foster Art, and Keep Entertainment Safe (NO FAKES) Act to protect individual voice and visual likeness from unauthorized digital or AI-generated replicas. The bill would hold individuals or companies liable for producing, hosting, or sharing a digital replica of an individual performing in an audiovisual work, image, or sound recording that they never appeared in or approved of. An online service hosting the unauthorized replica would be required to take down the replica once the owner informs it of unauthorized use.
NTIA Releases Report on Dual-Use Foundation Models with Widely Available Model Weights
The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has released a report reviewing the risks and benefits of large AI models with widely available weights, as directed under President Biden’s Executive Order on AI from last year. In the report, NTIA calls on the U.S. government to refrain from restricting open model weights at this time, and instead collect evidence about their capabilities to design future policies that manage potential risks.
U.K. Government Cuts Funding for Major Computing and AI Projects
The UK’s Labor government has canceled two major funding commitments that the previous administration had made—a total of $1.7 billion for two projects—that would have bolstered the country’s global standing in AI research and development. The first project would have funded an initiative to provide UK researchers with access to AI research resources, and the second would have funded the development of a next-generation supercomputer at the University of Edinburgh to run advanced AI models.