Never mind killer robots and sci-fi doomsday scenarios. A former Google executive says we need a slowdown in AI development now because the tech is already harming children at a scale that’s surpassing the damage wreaked by social media.
“We find ourselves in a really terrible situation in terms of what AI is doing to kids,” Tom Siegel, the former vice president of trust and safety at Google, told Reuters. “The idea that the industry will figure it out by itself without outside help is unrealistic.”
Major AI companies, Siegel says, are releasing their features without creating robust enough guardrails. On Tuesday, he announced he had joined the children’s online advocacy group Common Sense Media, serving as first executive director of its newly launched Youth AI Safety Institute. Some of the nonprofit’s backers, it’s worth noting, include Anthropic and the OpenAI Foundation.
AI companies have come under fire for their role in so-called AI psychosis, cases in which an AI incites and drives a user’s delusional behavior. Numerous lawsuits allege that an older version of ChatGPT powered by GPT-4o even drove users to suicide.
