This is the script of my national radio report yesterday on the major
risks associated with the "AI Agents" that Big Tech is now pushing on
consumers. As always, there may have been a few minor wording changes
from this script as I presented this report live on air.
- - -
Yeah, so obviously we've spoken quite a few times about various
aspects of AI -- so called but not really artificial intelligence.
Both the positive applications, for example to name just one, in some
aspects of medical diagnostics where large amounts of data need to be
analyzed, and also in the many and growing negative aspects.
And we know these negative aspects mostly relate right now to what is
called generative AI, and include services like Google's frequently
completely wrong or misleading or partly wrong Search AI Overviews,
where the Google disclaimer says that the answers can be wrong and
essentially that you're on your own. And then there are the AI
Chatbots that have been embroiled in all kinds of problems and used in
scams and involved in other controversies even in the relatively short
time they've been around.
This is all as the Big Tech firms keep pushing out various mediocre at
best types of AI technologies. They're in a desperate search for a way
to somehow make a profit from the incredibly massive financial
investments they've made in these AI systems and the related data
centers that are sucking up enormous amount of energy to keep these
largely intrusive AI systems going.
And you might have thought to yourself, well, at least it can't really
get any worse. And I'm here to say, oh my, it can get a LOT worse --
you ain't seen nuthin' yet in terms of worse. One example currently is
the push by Google and various other Big Tech firms to convince you to
use what are called "AI Agents". And what is an AI Agent you might ask?
Well, the idea is that these go a giant step further into invading
your life beyond what the other AI systems have been doing to this
point, by actually taking control of your web browser and acting on
your behalf to find and do Internet stuff for you. In other words, the
AI Agent takes over, and pretends to be you doing various searches and
clicks on websites and gathering information, and then all you have to
do is enter payment information to pay for whatever goodies, maybe
products, plane flights, whatever the AI Agent has found for you.
Ultimately we can suspect that the concept will be that the AI Agents
would routinely actually make the purchases themselves, with your
money of course.
And yeah, it doesn't take a lot of imagination to see how this could
go horribly wrong in terms error prone AIs interacting with sites when
you're the one who will be held responsible for those actions. Because
there's no evidence so far that I've seen that the AI firms are
willing to take responsibility for their AI agents' actions. And then
we need to consider what would happen if these AI agents are hacked,
or your computer is hacked in a way that permits hackers to manipulate
the AI agents and do who knows what from your computer, where again,
you're the one who will likely be held responsible for everything that
happens.
Consumer use of AI agents isn't likely to be mandatory -- at least for
now -- but you can be sure that the AI firms are going to be hyping
this tech to the ends of the Earth, and doing everything possible to
rope you into using the agents.
It's important to understand what's really going on. Remember, these
firms have in significant respects placed almost or in some cases
perhaps virtually ALL of their bets on AI. They are pouring money,
untold billions of dollars, into this technology that of course nobody
really asked for. And they are in key respects in an existential panic
now because their business models depend on making as many individuals
and businesses as possible dependent on these AI systems for as much
as possible in their daily lives.
And whether you want to call that an offer or a trap, it's not
something that I personally have any interest in participating with,
and perhaps, though the choice is of course yours, maybe neither
should you.
- - -
L
- - -
--Lauren--
Lauren Weinstein
[email protected] (https://www.vortex.com/lauren)
Lauren's Blog: https://lauren.vortex.com
Mastodon: https://mastodon.laurenweinstein.org/@lauren
Founder: Network Neutrality Squad: https://www.nnsquad.org
PRIVACY Forum: https://www.vortex.com/privacy-info
Co-Founder: People For Internet Responsibility
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