Re:After OpenAI's blowup, it seems pretty clear that 'AI saf...
by mike_hearn on Friday November 24, 2023 @04:22AM
(#38402020)
> An advanced enough auto-GPT bot given a bad goal might be all you need. Cripple enough infrastructure and humanity is going to be starving to death within weeks.
AI risk enthusiasts tend to define "bad goal" as one that sounds reasonable but has unexpected side effects. The real risk to infrastructure and physical safety though is that people will use AI to assist in hacking during a hot war. In this case the goal is only bad from the perspective of one side of the conflict, and the solutions are the same in any event because human hackers can also do a lot of damage, at least in theory. Our computing infrastructure hasn't ever really been tested in a hot war between sophisticated powers, the closest is currently Russia v Ukraine where electricity outages and the like have been caused by hackers but the damage seems minor compared to that inflicted by conventional warfare. So this is maybe a "hopeful" outcome - the much touted cyberwarfare has fizzled so far.
So the argument would have to become that AI hackers will be vastly better at disruption than human hackers are. And I guess I can sort of believe that in principle one day but currently they are very far away from this sort of capability.
AI risk enthusiasts tend to define "bad goal" as one that sounds reasonable but has unexpected side effects. The real risk to infrastructure and physical safety though is that people will use AI to assist in hacking during a hot war. In this case the goal is only bad from the perspective of one side of the conflict, and the solutions are the same in any event because human hackers can also do a lot of damage, at least in theory. Our computing infrastructure hasn't ever really been tested in a hot war between sophisticated powers, the closest is currently Russia v Ukraine where electricity outages and the like have been caused by hackers but the damage seems minor compared to that inflicted by conventional warfare. So this is maybe a "hopeful" outcome - the much touted cyberwarfare has fizzled so far.
So the argument would have to become that AI hackers will be vastly better at disruption than human hackers are. And I guess I can sort of believe that in principle one day but currently they are very far away from this sort of capability.