The prowess of the American chatbot ChatGPT, launched in November 2022 and capable of formulating detailed answers in seconds on a wide range of topics, is being followed with interest in China. The interface is not accessible in the country, but ChatGPT is the subject of countless articles and discussions on social networks, and local tech giants are vying to design equivalent tools in China.
The search engine Baidu was one of the first Chinese groups to position itself in this niche, joined by the champion of the Internet and video games Tencent or even Alibaba, a pioneer in e-commerce. And in full euphoria vis-à-vis so-called generative artificial intelligence, China wishes to regulate this technology.
Before being made available, products operating with generative artificial intelligence must “request a safety inspection”, according to a draft regulation released Tuesday, April 11, 2023, by the China Cyberspace Administration. The regulator, which submits its text for public comment before adoption, does not specify when the regulations will come into force.
“Socialist values”
Content generated by artificial intelligence must “reflect fundamental socialist values and should not contain [d’éléments relatifs] to the subversion of state power”, says the draft regulations. They will also have to respect the right to intellectual property, specifies the document. The regulations aim “the healthy development and standard application of generative artificial intelligence technology”.
It is “one of the strictest measures” to frame artificial intelligence such as ChatGPT, Andy Chun, a technology expert at the University of Hong Kong, told AFP. China aims to become the world leader in artificial intelligence by 2030, which will revolutionize a multitude of sectors including the automotive industry and medicine.
Baidu was the first in its country to announce that it is working on a local equivalent to ChatGPT. Presented last month to the press, Ernie Bot, which works in Mandarin and is only aimed at the Chinese market, is currently only available in beta version. E-commerce giant Alibaba unveiled its own on Tuesday, Tongyi Qianwen (machine that knows everything).
“Be very carrefully”
In the race for artificial intelligence, the main difficulty in China for developers is to offer a powerful conversational robot, but which does not deviate from the very strict framework allowed in terms of content. Thus, with this future regulation, companies will have to “be very carrefully” that each piece of data used to feed their artificial intelligence “be compliant” guidelines,” says Andy Chun. Moreover, “Guaranteeing the accuracy (of answers) is difficult. No generative artificial intelligence system can do this to date”he points out.
China is at the forefront of regulating new technologies, which some see as a potential threat to the stability or power of the Communist Party. After years of laxity, the authorities have since 2020 been intransigent with regard to the practices of powerful digital companies, in particular on issues related to personal data.
China already closely monitors its internet and media, with an army of censors erasing content that portrays state policy in a bad light or is likely to create unrest. Social networks are subject to increased control. The regime had already asked the Internet giants last year to reveal their algorithms, a generally well-kept secret.
The country also tightened in January the supervision of deepfake, these digital manipulations of increasingly realistic images and which present a challenge in the fight against disinformation.