Italy has taken an important step in addressing the ethical concerns of artificial intelligence (AI) systems such as ChatGPT. The country’s data protection watchdog, led by Pasquale Stanzione, stated they are ready to allow the return of ChatGPT chatbot from its maker OpenAI at the end of April if certain steps are taken to address their concerns.
The investigation began in late March as the watchdog temporarily restricted OpenAI’s personal data processing for ChatGPT, and requested a list of demands to be met by April 30th 2021. Italy is the first country to take action in the western part of Europe but AI advancements aren’t unseen in the eyes of lawmakers and regulators in other countries.
In response to the mounting pressure, EU lawmakers urged world leaders on Monday to consider a summit to address the dangers of accelerated AI growth. Stanzione reiterated the urgency of their decision, communicating that the European decision-making process would lead to a 3-4 month delay.
OpenAI is backed by Microsoft and initially took ChatGPT offline in Italy before the watchdog took action. This allowed them to make certain changes to the chatbot in order to meet the requested conditions of the watchdog. The goal of these safety measures is to protect the personal information of users and ensure the chatbot is not compromising user’s privacy.
OpenAI is an American artificial intelligence (AI) research laboratory based in San Francisco, California and founded by Elon Musk, Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, Ilya Sutskever, and Wojciech Zaremba. OpenAI has two objectives: “to develop open source AI technologies, and to promote beneficial use of the resulting technologies.”
Pasquale Stanzione is the head of the data protection watchdog in Italy. He has been an integral part of the investigation and ensuring a secure reintegration of ChatGPT into the Italian market, if OpenAI is willing to take action. Stanzione also serves as an advisor in the Centre of Studies and Researches on innovation and intellectual property at the University of Rome Tor Vergata. Additionally, he is on the board of directors at the Italian National Institute of Statistics (ISTAT) and serves as a professor of computer law.
