Richard Marles: AI in defence must adhere to global treaties
Australia’s Defence Minister said it was ‘fundamentally important’ to have rules about engaging in warfare apply to the way artificial intelligence is used in battle.
Australia’s Defence Minister, Richard Marles, said it was “fundamentally important” to have rules about engaging in warfare apply to the way artificial intelligence is used in battle.
Australia has signed up to the Bletchley Declaration at the AI Safety Summit at Bletchley Park, on Thursday, where 28 countries, including China, have agreed to collaborate on testing the next generation of artificial intelligence models against a range of critical national security, safety, and societal risks.
Mr Marles said, “It is critically important that artificial intelligence is not deployed in a defence context which undermines the obligations that we have under a range of international treaties.” He added, “When it comes to defence it has a place but it can‘t be a place which corrodes the very important international architecture which sits around the way defence operates. It’s important that there is a human-centred way in which we proceed, so that the various obligations that we have around a range of treaties to which we are a party in the defence space are able to be maintained.”
He said in response to a question about whether robots would consider such treaties that it was fundamental to ensure a human focus so that AI was “useful and not erode obligations”. Both the United States and the UK have announced artificial intelligence institutes to be able to monitor and test AI applications and developments. Mr Marles said Australia will work with both institutes to help formulate Australia’s own AI policies.
The Bletchley declaration was signed by countries like Australia, Canada, the European Union, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Singapore, the United States of America, and the United Kingdom; and industry leaders of Amazon Web Services, Anthropic, Google, Google DeepMind, Inflection AI, Meta, Microsoft, Mistral AI and Open AI all of whom recognise the importance of bringing together governments and actors developing AI within their countries and to collaborate on testing the next generation of Artificial Intelligence models against a range of critical risks.
Industry and Science Minister Ed Husic said Australia wants a safe and responsible framework for the operation of AI. The Bletchley declaration had produced “a seismic shift in the way that the world thinks about the building and the application of technology,” he said, noting “It gives us a greater chance for countries across the world to work together to make sure we get the balance right”.
Mr Husic said he was excited about the AI developments but worried about some of its application. “I’m not worried about robots taking over, I’m worried about the prospect of AI-generated disinformation,“ he said. ”
We need to be able to help detect and also be able to project to the public what is synthetic or artificially generated information and what’s the real deal? And how do we protect ourselves against misinformation and getting that balance right is really important.”
Within the next 12 months, further summits will be held in South Korea and France to help develop an international framework to assess, and monitor AI advances. The Bletchley Park summit host, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said it wasn’t appropriate for the tech companies to “mark their own homework”, saying it was the responsibility of governments to keep people safe.
Mr Sunak said: “There is a genuine debate about the risks, the most extreme risks, like nuclear war or pandemics, and my view is even if a small possibility is that it happens, the right response is to act. We have to reassure we are taking steps to mitigate that risk no matter how remote or in the future.”
Demis Hassabis, chief executive of Google DeepMind said: “AI can help solve some of the most critical challenges of our time, from curing disease to addressing the climate crisis. But it will also present new challenges for the world and we must ensure the technology is built and deployed safely. Getting this right will take a collective effort from governments, industry and civil society to inform and develop robust safety tests and evaluations.“
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