FILE - A person stands in front of a Meta sign outside of the company’s headquarters in Menlo Park, Calif., March 7, 2023. Tech giants including Meta and Google are joining small tech startups in California to push back on an ambitious bill aiming to regulate powerful generative AI systems. They argue the proposal would stifle innovation in a state that is touting itself as a global AI hub. FILE - State Sen.
Democratic state Sen. Scott Wiener, who authors the bill, said the proposal would provide reasonable safety standards by preventing “catastrophic harms” from extremely powerful AI models that may be created in the future. The requirements would only apply to systems that cost more than $100 million in computing power to train. No current AI models have hit that threshold as of July.
The proposal, supported by some of the most renowned AI researchers, would also create a new state agency to oversee developers and provide best practices. The state attorney general also would be able to pursue legal actions in case of violations. “The bill will make the AI ecosystem less safe, jeopardize open-source models relied on by startups and small businesses, rely on standards that do not exist, and introduce regulatory fragmentation,” Rob Sherman, Meta vice president and deputy chief privacy officer, wrote in a letter sent to lawmakers.