Still, OpenAI’s lobbying effort appears to have been a success: the final draft of the Act approved by E.U. lawmakers did not contain wording present in earlier drafts suggesting that general purpose AI systems should be considered inherently high risk.
In a statement to TIME, an OpenAI spokesperson said: “At the request of policymakers in the E.U., in September 2022 we provided an overview of our approach to deploying systems like GPT-3 safely, and commented on the then-draft of the [AI Act] based on that experience. Since then, the [AI Act] has evolved substantially and we’ve spoken publicly about the technology’s advancing capabilities and adoption. We continue to engage with policymakers and support the E.U.
One expert who reviewed the OpenAI White Paper at TIME’s request was unimpressed. “What they’re saying is basically: trust us to self-regulate,” says Daniel Leufer, a senior policy analyst focused on AI at Access Now’s Brussels office. “It’s very confusing because they’re talking to politicians saying, ‘Please regulate us,’ they’re boasting about all the [safety] stuff that they do, but as soon as you say, ‘Well, let’s take you at your word and set that as a regulatory floor,’ they say no.
A “high risk” designation would subject OpenAI to stringent legal requirements including transparency, traceability, and human oversight