The dark side of artificial intelligence: is AI as good as we are told?

What is artificial intelligence?Now they talk about him from almost every corner: "the first smartphone with artificial intelligence", "camera with artificial intelligence" and so on. Marketers have learned very well to attribute to AI any computational work performed by a device, be it a phone, tablet or car. In fact, all of this is, by and large, toys. True artificial intelligence is beyond the reach of most, and it seems to become as gold-bearing for this century as oil was in the past. It is being developed by states and corporations with billions of dollars in funding - in the United States alone, investments in AI over the past year amounted to more than $ 25 billion... And such artificial intelligence carries not only advantages, but also dangers.

Many people underestimate the dangers of artificial intelligence. And no, this is not about the movie "Terminator"

I recently read a very good book on this topic, "The dark side of artificial intelligence" from Stanislav Petrovsky, who went toRidero's publishing platform. Previously, I studied mainly the works of foreign scientists, but this time the topic turned out to be very close to me. Moreover, the author of the book is a candidate of legal sciences, worked as a senior researcher at the Institute of State and Law of the Russian Academy of Sciences. For over 20 years he has been researching the legal regulation of information technologies and is a laureate of the All-Russian competition of legislative initiatives in the field of human rights protection. He certainly understands not only high technologies, but also their impact on human life, including at the highest level.

Artificial Intelligence Challenges

No, there are no conspiracy theories orstories of how the terminators will destroy humanity in the future. The author raises much more pressing problems related to the rights and freedoms of citizens, which are already emerging. This includes the black market for personal data (remember, when was the last time bank scammers called you), and total surveillance, and the monopoly of social networks, and gadgetomania at the level of the youngest generations. Not to mention the fact that all this together and separately is used now in coups d'état.

Artificial Intelligence May Become "Immortal Dictator" - Elon Musk, head of Tesla and SpaceX.

Already in the introduction, the author describes how theinternational race in the field of artificial intelligence. For example, I did not know that in 2017 the Azilomar AI Principles were approved, which the largest companies and AI experts around the world agreed to abide by, but now everyone is violating them. I highly recommend the chapters "Natural intelligence" and "What is called artificial intelligence": there the author just describes what AI really is - raises the very problem that I wrote about at the very beginning of this article. The difference between a strong AI (artificial intelligence), which does not yet exist, and a weak (specialized) AI, which is already being implemented, is described in a very clear language. The main directions of AI application, the history of AI victories over humans, as well as scenarios of threats to humanity when creating a strong AI are described.

Why AI is dangerous

Separately, the book deals with the problem of "deepfakes"(deep fake). Already, with the help of artificial intelligence, it is possible to create fake videos and voices indistinguishable from the truth by eye, and often with the help of expertise. One of the clearest examples is the recent video with Tom Cruise, in which, in fact, not him, but his copy of deep fake. Even the experts could not notice the fake the first time, what can we say about the rest?

Also discussed in the book as AI flaws(for example, in the case of an erroneous triggering of the face recognition system), and its danger for many people, because the introduction of AI will lead to the disappearance of some and the emergence of other professions, which in the next decade may lead to the highest unemployment in the last hundred years. Not to mention the unlimited power of AI-related developments for IT giants (chapter "Monopolizing Everything").

Artificial intelligence is as dangerous as nuclear weapons! - Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft.

And, of course, the author did not bypass the threat to personal data, which there ALREADY now... Do you know, for example, how many organizationsgive permission to process personal data when you sign a seemingly innocent form on the Internet? How many hacks do hackers do each year?

I have only positive emotions fromAfter reading the book "The Dark Side of Artificial Intelligence", it makes you seriously think about what awaits us in a few years with the same level of technology development. I advise you to read it, it will be of interest to everyone who wants to know how modern information technologies affect society, and not only to experts in artificial intelligence.