DeepAI founder on the risks of artificial intelligence

Attitudes towards generative AI changed overnight and leaders within AI are expressing concern over the use and regulation of this powerful technology.

Kevin Baragona, founder of DeepAI spoke to Digital Nation regarding his reservations about the technology, the need for regulation and if there is risk to our jobs in the future.

DeepAI is a deep learning platform that offers both a chat and image generator product. Baragona said DeepAI helps researchers, developers, and the general public use the latest AI.

Before the surge in popularity, Baragona said AI used to be this “weird little thing in the corner no one outside tech cared about”.

“Almost overnight, AI has been something that everyone uses and that's been amazing to see. Attitudes have changed, frankly, because this technology is a little scary, it’s not a toy anymore. It is certainly also a toy, but it's an incredibly powerful tool,” he said.

Baragona explained one of the major concerns he sees is over AI taking people’s jobs and he is worried too.

“There's almost no type of knowledge work, whether you're a programmer, an artist, a software, a finance person, a writer, we're all being affected all at once,” he said.

“If it's any consolation, no one's been singled out here. The attitude has changed from what is this weird little toy in the background? To, oh my God, how are we going to handle this? That's been the shift.”

Six month pause

With the fast development of AI applications like ChatGPT, thousands of people within the AI field signed a petition asking for a six-month pause on all AI. 

Baragona said he is in favour of the six-month pause but has accepted that it most likely won't be happening anytime soon.

“[It was] a symbolic move, but it got people thinking in the right direction. Now we're having these congressional hearings, I'd say it's had an impact,” he said.

“The sad truth is I don't think we have the right set of leaders in our country to regulate this new technology properly. We want to get the benefit while keeping the harm to a minimum.”

He said he is not alone in being rather disappointed with their current set of leaders.

“No matter which party you're from, they don't seem to be able to work together on anything meaningful, certainly nothing complex with AI, as it is a super complex issue to try to regulate,” he explained.

Instead of regulating AI directly, Baragona said governments should regulate and enforce strictly against any harm it might produce.

“I would say that deep fakes are a great example of when you make a deep fake to trick someone into thinking that someone else is speaking. People have used deep fakes against politicians, we need to treat that as a major crime,” he said.

Baragona said deep fakes should not exist at all.

“They should eventually be criminalised. I would advocate, not for specifically regulating AI but for strictly enforcing against specific harms from occurring, while allowing the technology to develop as freely as possible so that society can benefit from these advances,” he explained.

While there are risks involved with AI, Baragona said there are still benefits from the technology.

“It’s encouraging in the sense that we're almost guaranteed to get some type of economic boom from this. I would say this is as big as the internet, or smartphones, or probably more,” he said.

“Certainly, a lot of great things came out of the internet and smartphones. Regulatory questions aside, this is going to be really good for all of our lives most likely.”