Schneier on Security

This essay appeared as part of a round table on “Power and Governance in the Age of AI.”

The increasingly centralized control of AI is an ominous sign. When tech billionaires and corporations steer AI, we get AI that tends to reflect the interests of tech billionaires and corporations, instead of the public. Given how transformative this technology will be for the world, this is a problem.

To benefit society as a whole we need an AI public option—not to replace corporate AI but to serve as a counterbalance—as well as stronger democratic institutions to govern all of AI. Like public roads and the federal postal system, a public AI option could guarantee universal access to this transformative technology and set an implicit standard that private services must surpass to compete…