Open source AI need to look at Section 4.6 of Biden's Executive Order

8 points

3 years ago

The open source AI community seems to have picked up on the statements in Bidens executive order stating, "... if it requires a quantity of computing power greater than 1026 integer or floating-point operations and is trained on a computing cluster that has a set of machines physically co-located in a single datacenter, transitively connected by data center networking of over 100 Gbit/s, and having a theoretical maximum compute capacity of 1020 integer or floating-point operations per second for training AI"

However, this isn't an ohh, open source AI and Local LLM community will be fine, there's also section 4.6, which reads:

``` 4.6. Soliciting Input on Dual-Use Foundation Models with Widely Available Model Weights. When the weights for a dual-use foundation model are widely available — such as when they are publicly posted on the Internet — there can be substantial benefits to innovation, but also substantial security risks, such as the removal of safeguards within the model. To address the risks and potential benefits of dual-use foundation models with widely available weights, within 270 days of the date of this order, the Secretary of Commerce, acting through the Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Communications and Information, and in consultation with the Secretary of State, shall:

     (a)  solicit input from the private sector, academia, civil society, and other stakeholders through a public consultation process on potential risks, benefits, other implications, and appropriate policy and regulatory approaches related to dual-use foundation models for which the model weights are widely available, including:

          (i)    risks associated with actors fine-tuning dual-use foundation models for which the model weights are widely available or removing those models’ safeguards;

          (ii)   benefits to AI innovation and research, including research into AI safety and risk management, of dual-use foundation models for which the model weights are widely available; and

          (iii)  potential voluntary, regulatory, and international mechanisms to manage the risks and maximize the benefits of dual-use foundation models for which the model weights are widely available; and

     (b)  based on input from the process described in subsection 4.6(a) of this section, and in consultation with the heads of other relevant agencies as the Secretary of Commerce deems appropriate, submit a report to the President on the potential benefits, risks, and implications of dual-use foundation models for which the model weights are widely available, as well as policy and regulatory recommendations pertaining to those models.

``` ~ <https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2023/10/30/executive-order-on-the-safe-secure-and-trustworthy-development-and-use-of-artificial-intelligence/>

And what is "dual-use foundation model"? The definition as layed out in the order is as follows:

``` (k) The term “dual-use foundation model” means an AI model that is trained on broad data; generally uses self-supervision; contains at least tens of billions of parameters; is applicable across a wide range of contexts; and that exhibits, or could be easily modified to exhibit, high levels of performance at tasks that pose a serious risk to security, national economic security, national public health or safety, or any combination of those matters, such as by:

(i) substantially lowering the barrier of entry for non-experts to design, synthesize, acquire, or use chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear (CBRN) weapons;

(ii) enabling powerful offensive cyber operations through automated vulnerability discovery and exploitation against a wide range of potential targets of cyber attacks; or

(iii) permitting the evasion of human control or oversight through means of deception or obfuscation.

Models meet this definition even if they are provided to end users with technical safeguards that attempt to prevent users from taking advantage of the relevant unsafe capabilities. ```

This is what open source AI developers need to be concerned about. We have no idea what the recomendations coming back in <270 days will be. And we have no idea what restrictions will be set in place. I think it's safe to say there will be something.

What can we do? Not all of us want to, or can work for large companies, at research institutions or in academia.

(a) solicit input from the private sector, academia, civil society, and other stakeholders through a public consultation process on potential risks, benefits, other implications, and appropriate policy and regulatory approaches related to dual-use foundation models for which the model weights are widely available, including: (i) risks associated with actors fine-tuning dual-use foundation models for which the model weights are widely available or removing those models’ safeguards; (ii) benefits to AI innovation and research, including research into AI safety and risk management, of dual-use foundation models for which the model weights are widely available; and (iii) potential voluntary, regulatory, and international mechanisms to manage the risks and maximize the benefits of dual-use foundation models for which the model weights are widely available; and (b) based on input from the process described in subsection 4.6(a) of this section, and in consultation with the heads of other relevant agencies as the Secretary of Commerce deems appropriate, submit a report to the President on the potential benefits, risks, and implications of dual-use foundation models for which the model weights are widely available, as well as policy and regulatory recommendations pertaining to those models.