Biden administration to host global AI safety summit in November

The Biden administration has scheduled a global safety summit on artificial intelligence (AI) for November 20-21 in San Francisco.

The event will be led by Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who will coordinate a coalition of countries and institutions to tackle AI safety, innovation, and inclusion. The summit will also feature the official launch of the International Network of AI Safety Institutes, established in May this year.

The International Network of AI Safety Institutes was announced during the second AI Safety Summit, held in South Korea in May 2024. The network was launched to facilitate collaboration between experts from countries interested in the positive creation of AI.

The initial members are Australia, Canada, the European Union, France, Japan, Kenya, the Republic of Korea, Singapore, the United Kingdom and the United States. 

The San Francisco summit seeks to build on these efforts in preparation for a larger AI Action Summit planned for Paris in February 2025. The US Commerce Department and State Department stated that the summit will convene technical professionals from each member’s AI safety institute.

Biden’s executive order sets new AI safety requirements

In a separate but related development, the Biden administration is still advocating for improved AI governance through executive orders. On October 15, 2023, President Joe Biden signed an Executive Order to set new safety requirements for AI. Besides the regulatory measures, the Biden administration has introduced new measures to address the increasing infrastructure requirements of AI in the United States. 

On September 12, a new AI task force was announced, comprising some of the industry’s leading executives to help the government with AI policy and infrastructure. The members of the task force are OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Google’s SVP Ruth Porat, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, and others.

The group will help the US navigate the fast-paced growth of AI. Additionally, it will ensure that the country can hold its ground in the international market without compromising on safety.