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CNBC – Craig Newmark pours millions into combating AI dark side

  |   By Polling+ Staff

Dr. Arati Prabhaker, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, Dr. Craig Martell, chief digital and artificial intelligence officer at the Defense Department, and Eric Hysen, chief information officer of the Homeland Security Department, are sworn in during a hearing of the House Oversight CommitteeÕs Cybersecurity, Information Technology, and Government Innovation Subcommittee on Capitol Hill September 14, 2023 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Brendan Smialowski / AFP) (Photo by BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images)

And AI is continuing to strike a nerve out there.

CNBC headlines this: https://www.cnbc.com/2023/09/14/craigslists-craig-newmark-funding-common-sense-media-ai-project.html

Craigslist founder Craig Newmark is pouring millions of dollars into combating AI’s dark side

CNBC reports:

“The rapid evolution of AI and its potential hazards has recently caught Newmark’s attention, and his money.

The goal of Common Sense’s AI project is to provide an AI ratings system for parents, educators, policy makers and regulators so they can evaluate what makes certain tools like OpenAI’s ChatGPT safe or unsafe for children. Additionally, the nonprofit is offering online AI literacy courses intended to help parents and educators teach basic AI fundamentals to children.

The full scope of AI’s capabilities and potential for societal harm became more clear to Newmark by the time companies began ‘modifying search engines to use generative AI.’

‘I realized that if a search engine was using sources that weren’t reliable, if the sources were about lying to people, that would create a big, ethical problem, and you really don’t want a news source of any sort to knowingly lie,’ Newmark said.

Newmark is concerned that bad actors will use generative AI to more easily amplify and spread disinformation. At the same time, he’s worried that tech companies, particularly in social media, ‘aren’t even trying anymore to get rid of stuff they know is dishonest,’ he said.”

In other words? In other words the 21st century keeps moving in a decidedly non-20th century fashion, flooding the world with Big Tech, social media and now Artificial Intelligence. And average, everyday Americans are left scrambling to keep up.