OpenAI CEO to Testify Before Senate as Congress Considers Legislation
Sam Altman speaks during a keynote address announcing ChatGPT integration for Bing at Microsoft in Redmond, Washington, on February 7, 2023. Altman will testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee May 16. JASON REDMOND/AFP via Getty Images
By
Frank Konkel
OpenAI is the parent company of ChatGPT, a generative artificial intelligence tool gaining in popularity.
OpenAI Chief Executive Officer Sam Altman may be in the Washington, D.C. area again next week—after attending a White House meeting on artificial intelligence earlier in the month—this time to testify before a Senate Judiciary subcommittee on Tuesday, May 16.
The hearing is titled “Oversight of AI: Rules for Artificial Intelligence,” and comes as Congress considers multiple pieces of AI-related legislation, including whether AI should be able to make consequential national security decisions autonomously and whether AI-created political ads should contain disclaimers.
Altman, whose company created the popular and controversial ChatGPT technology, met with Vice President Kamala Harris and other top administration officials on May 4 at the White House to discuss “responsible innovation” in AI.
ChatGPT and other generative AI platforms have blown up in popularity in recent months, writing poetry, authoring essays, conducting human-like conversations and even passing medical school exams. Future versions of the software could offer users even more capabilities, but some worry the technology’s advancement could displace millions of jobs and pose more subtle problems.
According to the Washington Post, Christina Montgomery, chief privacy and trust officer at IBM and Gary Marcus, professor emeritus at New York University, will also testify before the Senate Judiciary subcommittee.