Dubai Telegraph - Humanity in 'race against time' on AI: UN

EUR -
AED 3.938479
AFN 73.284283
ALL 98.19234
AMD 417.267449
ANG 1.943348
AOA 978.447316
ARS 1071.53141
AUD 1.629089
AWG 1.930079
AZN 1.82711
BAM 1.955647
BBD 2.17713
BDT 128.849948
BGN 1.9562
BHD 0.406468
BIF 3183.551653
BMD 1.072266
BND 1.425189
BOB 7.467417
BRL 6.152562
BSD 1.078316
BTN 90.972903
BWP 14.300884
BYN 3.528725
BYR 21016.42052
BZD 2.17343
CAD 1.49386
CDF 3073.115756
CHF 0.939162
CLF 0.03726
CLP 1028.119797
CNY 7.698019
CNH 7.63378
COP 4640.937963
CRC 551.556973
CUC 1.072266
CUP 28.415058
CVE 110.256399
CZK 25.259812
DJF 192.015021
DKK 7.459869
DOP 64.934934
DZD 142.958848
EGP 52.835878
ERN 16.083995
ETB 133.503285
FJD 2.399951
FKP 0.820465
GBP 0.830088
GEL 2.916983
GGP 0.820465
GHS 17.683621
GIP 0.820465
GMD 76.671173
GNF 9295.27488
GTQ 8.33535
GYD 225.592402
HKD 8.336174
HNL 27.205878
HRK 7.386875
HTG 141.888931
HUF 407.236454
IDR 16786.168917
ILS 4.020796
IMP 0.820465
INR 90.481213
IQD 1412.489812
IRR 45134.375558
ISK 148.766647
JEP 0.820465
JMD 171.076654
JOD 0.760348
JPY 163.686863
KES 139.08915
KGS 92.433433
KHR 4378.658423
KMF 493.644665
KPW 965.039476
KRW 1499.246878
KWD 0.328832
KYD 0.89853
KZT 530.808592
LAK 23665.153893
LBP 96559.167469
LKR 315.465391
LRD 204.33406
LSL 18.869628
LTL 3.166124
LVL 0.648604
LYD 5.232592
MAD 10.648369
MDL 19.338491
MGA 4988.610841
MKD 61.5252
MMK 3482.679288
MNT 3643.561097
MOP 8.633826
MRU 42.957649
MUR 49.75717
MVR 16.566921
MWK 1869.754141
MXN 21.634265
MYR 4.699212
MZN 68.521819
NAD 18.869628
NGN 1788.626462
NIO 39.676905
NOK 11.794827
NPR 145.556645
NZD 1.797446
OMR 0.412628
PAB 1.078316
PEN 4.044584
PGK 4.328662
PHP 62.679371
PKR 299.424042
PLN 4.325898
PYG 8431.342275
QAR 3.931893
RON 4.977143
RSD 116.980874
RUB 104.99181
RWF 1478.084695
SAR 4.02742
SBD 8.943509
SCR 14.390377
SDG 644.972153
SEK 11.594849
SGD 1.4214
SHP 0.820465
SLE 24.501684
SLL 22484.885861
SOS 616.251927
SRD 37.497551
STD 22193.748611
SVC 9.435264
SYP 2694.101668
SZL 18.864528
THB 36.687634
TJS 11.462006
TMT 3.763655
TND 3.347839
TOP 2.511359
TRY 36.822021
TTD 7.327428
TWD 34.580984
TZS 2878.975413
UAH 44.514627
UGX 3946.692121
USD 1.072266
UYU 45.046486
UZS 13787.924411
VEF 3884341.194834
VES 47.874003
VND 27101.532073
VUV 127.301648
WST 3.003615
XAF 655.905833
XAG 0.031788
XAU 0.000394
XCD 2.897854
XDR 0.808437
XOF 655.905833
XPF 119.331742
YER 267.878982
ZAR 19.79817
ZMK 9651.687743
ZMW 29.35571
ZWL 345.269328
  • JRI

    0.1600

    13.53

    +1.18%

  • BCC

    1.4700

    142.32

    +1.03%

  • BCE

    0.3000

    28.37

    +1.06%

  • GSK

    -0.3700

    36.29

    -1.02%

  • RBGPF

    61.4000

    61.4

    +100%

  • CMSD

    0.2350

    25.125

    +0.94%

  • RIO

    -3.0400

    64.43

    -4.72%

  • SCS

    0.0600

    13.14

    +0.46%

  • CMSC

    0.1600

    24.84

    +0.64%

  • BTI

    -0.0100

    35.39

    -0.03%

  • RELX

    0.3200

    47.98

    +0.67%

  • VOD

    -0.0100

    9.31

    -0.11%

  • RYCEF

    0.0100

    7.15

    +0.14%

  • BP

    -0.8800

    28.93

    -3.04%

  • NGG

    -0.3600

    63.94

    -0.56%

  • AZN

    -0.2000

    64.49

    -0.31%

Humanity in 'race against time' on AI: UN
Humanity in 'race against time' on AI: UN / Photo: Fabrice COFFRINI - AFP

Humanity in 'race against time' on AI: UN

Humanity is in a race against time to harness the colossal emerging power of artificial intelligence for the good of all, while averting dire risks, a top UN official said Thursday.

Text size:

"We've let the genie out of the bottle," said Doreen Bogdan-Martin, head of the United Nations' International Telecommunications Union (ITU).

"We are in a race against time," she told the opening of a two-day AI for Good Global Summit in Geneva.

"Recent developments in AI have been nothing short of extraordinary."

The thousands gathered at the conference heard how advances in generative AI are already speeding up efforts to solve some of the world's most pressing problems, such as climate change, hunger and social care.

"I believe we have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to guide AI to benefit all the world's people," Bogdan-Martin told AFP ahead of the summit.

But she lamented Thursday that one-third of humanity still remains completely offline, and is "excluded from the AI revolution without a voice".

"This digital and technological divide is no longer acceptable."

Bogdan-Martin highlighted that AI holds "immense potential for both good and bad", stressing that it was vital to "make AI systems safe".

- Concentrated power -

She said that was especially important given that "2024 is the biggest election year in history", with votes in dozens of countries, including in the United States.

She flagged the "rise of sophisticated deep fakes disinformation campaigns" and warned that the "misuse of AI threaten democracy (and) also endangers young people's mental health and compromises cyber-security."

Other experts at Thursday's conference agreed.

"We have to understand what we're steering towards," said Tristan Harris, a technology ethicist who co-founded the Center for Humane Technology.

He pointed to lessons from social media -- initially touted as a way to connect people and give everyone a voice, but which also brought addiction, viral misinformation, online harassment and ballooning mental health issues.

Harris warned the incentive driving the companies rolling out the technology risked dramatically swelling such negative impacts.

"The number one thing that is driving Open AI or Google behaviour is the race to actually achieve market dominance," he said.

In such a world, he said, "governance that moves at the speed of technology" is vital.

- Changing the social contract -

OpenAI chief Sam Altman, who rose to global prominence after OpenAI released ChatGPT in 2022, acknowledged the dangers.

Speaking via video-link, he told the gathering that "cyber-security" was currently the biggest concern when it came to negative impacts of the technology.

Further down the road, he said there would likely "be some change required to the social contract, given how powerful we expect this technology to be".

"I'm not a believer that there won't be any jobs... but I do think the whole structure of society itself will be (open to) some degree of debate and reconfiguration."

Overall though, he insisted that from the perspective of how new technologies evolve historically, the AI systems were "generally considered safe and robust".

While welcoming discussions around regulations to stem short-term negative impacts of AI, he warned that it was "difficult" to suggest regulations aimed at reining in future impacts.

"We don't know how society and this technology are going to co-evolve," he said.

Bogdan-Martin meanwhile hailed that governments and others had recently "raced to establish protections" and regulation around the use of AI.

On Wednesday the European Union announced the creation of an AI Office to regulate artificial intelligence under a sweeping new law.

"It's our responsibility to write the next chapter in the great story of humanity, and technology, and to make it safe, to make it inclusive and to make it sustainable," Bogdan-Martin said.

H.El-Hassany--DT