The US is getting on top of AI technology and its advancements.
The US Congress is currently considering two separate bipartisan bills centering around AI amid growing interest in addressing issues surrounding them.
Should these bills pass through Congress, they could be the first laws the US will have toward managing AI.
AI-tackling Bills In The US Congress
US senators introduced two bipartisan bills on June 8 tackling issues surrounding AI - one would manage AI and require the government to be transparent when using AI to interact with people, while the other would gauge if the US is competitive against tech rivals like China, per Reuters.
According to a report from NBC, the latter bill, called the Global Technology Leadership Act, would establish an office that would determine how competitive the US is in critical technologies like AI compared to its tech rivals, such as China. This office, which would be called the Office of Global Competition Analysis, consists of experts from the intelligence community, the Pentagon, and other relevant agencies that use intel and private-sector commercial data to make its assessments.
The bill, introduced by US Senators Michael Bennet, Todd Young, and Mark Warner, likens the office to the Department of Defense, with it doing the same job as the DOD, but on technology instead of military hardware like battleships, tanks, and aircraft. They agree that creating such an office will help the US' competitiveness, inform policymakers, and strengthen US leadership in strategic innovation.
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The other bill, meanwhile, wants to require the US government to be transparent when using AI to interact with people and to create a way for people to appeal to any AI-made decisions.
According to Senator Mike Braun, one of the bill's authors, the federal government must be proactive and transparent with AI utilization and ensure decisions aren't made without living humans' input about them. Sen. Braun authored this bill alongside Senators Gary Peters and James Lankford.
Should these bills become law, they will become one of the first AI-related laws the US will have in response to technological advancements and risks presented by AI.
AI-Related Laws Across The World
The US is one of the many countries creating legislation to tackle the rise of AI and the benefits and detriments it brings. You may recall that the EU had pushed a draft regulating AI technology, called the AI Act, to its final stage; it may include new copyright rules for companies using generative AI tools.
This bill came with some proposals that seek to classify AI tools according to their perceived risk level to areas of concern, which include biometric surveillance and spreading misinformation or discriminatory language: from minimal to limited, high, and unacceptable.
Global Law firm Taylor Wessing also mentioned that the Canadian federal government is considering a similar bill known as the Digital Charter Implementation Act 2022. The third part of its legislative package contains the Artificial Intelligence and Data Act, which seeks to require certain persons to take measures to reduce the risk of harm and biased outcomes associated with high-performance AI systems to regulate international and interprovincial trade in AI systems.
