Washington, D.C. — U.S. Senator Jon Ossoff, Chairman of the Senate Human Rights Subcommittee, today convened a bipartisan hearing to explore the implications of artificial intelligence for human rights.
In his opening remarks, Chairman Ossoff highlighted both the risks and potential of AI technology.
“Throughout history, transformative technologies have emerged, with the potential to disrupt societies, economies, and politics profoundly and sometimes very quickly. AI capabilities are growing rapidly and in ways even its creators cannot predict, and already, it’s changing our lives,” Chairman Ossoff said. “American families are now threatened by AI-enabled scams, made far more sophisticated through this technology than traditional spam email or sham telemarking calls.”
“Our study of these technologies and associated risks should not blind us, of course, to this technology’s extraordinary potential,” Chairman Ossoff continued. “For example, cancer diagnoses, the development of new, lifesaving drugs and therapies, productivity growth, and the new forms of technological innovation that AI itself could help us to unlock. But at a moment like this, it is imperative that Congress understand the full range of risks and potentials to ensure this technology can be developed, deployed, used and regulated, consistent with our core values consistent with our national interest, consistent with civil and human rights.”
Click here to watch Sen. Ossoff’s opening statement.
Please find a transcript of Sen. Ossoff’s opening statement below.
CHAIRMAN OSSOFF: “The Subcommittee on Human Rights and the Law will come to order.
“Welcome, all, to today’s hearing. It is great to see a packed house — it demonstrates the intensity of interest in this subject.
“I want to thank you, Ranking Member Blackburn, for working so hard and so closely with me to develop this important bipartisan hearing, and I want to thank each of our witnesses for your participation today.
“Throughout history, transformative technologies have emerged, with the potential to disrupt societies, economies, and politics profoundly and sometimes very quickly.
“Machine learning and artificial intelligence may be such a technology.
“AI capabilities are growing rapidly, and in ways even its creators cannot predict.
“And already, it’s changing our lives.
“American families are now threatened by AI-enabled scams, made far more sophisticated through this technology than traditional spam email or sham telemarking calls.
“Today we will hear from Jennifer DeStefano, who was targeted by a scam using a deepfake of her 15-year-old daughter’s voice to fake her kidnapping and extort a ransom payment.
“AI also has profound implications for civil rights, for the criminal justice system, for our democratic and Constitutional processes, and for our privacy.
“Its potential impact on the future of work could include fundamental shifts in education, in recruitment, candidate screening and hiring, and perhaps even more significantly, rapid disruption of labor markets as certain professionals are automated.
“This technology has profound implications for the future of warfare, as kill chains are automated and predictive technology influences and mediates competition between nation-states.
“As AI technology develops, great powers competing in an AI arms race, engaged in strategic competition where AI is influencing the decisions made by leaders and militaries, face a different and new risk of escalation and miscalculation.
“And some influential technologists and engineers, including prominent figures and prominent leaders in the industry, warn of existential risks, ranging from catastrophic political destabilization, to the development and deployment of weapons of mass destruction, to catastrophic cybersecurity threats, and to unforeseeable and unknown forms of risk that may emergence alongside more and more powerful forms of artificial intelligences.
“Our study of these technologies and associated risks should not blind us, of course, to this technology’s extraordinary potential.
“For example, cancer diagnoses, the development of new, lifesaving drugs and therapies, productivity growth, and the new forms of technological innovation that AI itself could help us to unlock.
“But at a moment like this, it is imperative that Congress understand the full range of risks and potentials to ensure this technology can be developed, deployed, used and regulated, consistent with our core values consistent with our national interest, consistent with civil and human rights.
“So I look forward to a productive conversation with this talented and extraordinary panel this afternoon. And with that, I turn to the ranking member of the Subcommittee, my colleague from Tennessee, Senator Blackburn.”
