Introduction
The Biden administration is taking proactive steps to safeguard U.S. data centers from unauthorized access by foreign entities for AI model training. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo emphasized the need to prevent non-state actors, China, or any undesired parties from utilizing American cloud infrastructure to train their models. These measures are particularly crucial as the rapid growth of the AI industry has raised security concerns. The proposed “know your customer” regulation, created to address these issues, was made available for public review on Friday and will be officially published on Monday.
Denying China Compute Power
Raimondo expressed the United States’ determination to prevent China from accessing the computing power necessary to train advanced AI models. She highlighted the futility of restricting China’s access to such resources if they can circumvent the restrictions and exploit American cloud services. Last month, Commerce Secretary Raimondo announced the denial of Nvidia’s export license, preventing the shipment of high-performance AI chips to China. These actions are part of a larger effort to ensure that China’s military does not gain an unfair advantage in the development of cutting-edge AI systems.
Requirements for U.S. Cloud Computing Companies
To strengthen control over cloud computing infrastructure, the proposed regulation would mandate that U.S. cloud companies establish the identities of foreign individuals or organizations utilizing their services. This verification process would be integrated into a “know your customer” program or Customer Identification Program. Furthermore, the regulation would establish minimum standards for identifying foreign users and require cloud computing firms to certify compliance on an annual basis. Secretary Raimondo stressed that cloud providers need to have a clear understanding of their major customers and the nature of the models they are training.
Ensuring Transparency and Compliance
In October, President Joe Biden signed an executive order that requires AI system developers to share the results of safety tests with the United States government before releasing them to the public. The Commerce Department, in line with this order, will soon send out survey requests to companies operating in this field. Secretary Raimondo stressed the importance of companies complying with these requirements, viewing any reluctance to do so as a cause for concern. However, Carl Szabo, General Counsel at NetChoice, a tech industry trade group, cautioned that such reporting requirements could hinder international collaboration and deter the use of U.S. cloud resources for training large language models.
Major Players in Cloud Computing
Prominent cloud providers, including Amazon.com’s AWS, Alphabet’s Google Cloud, and Microsoft’s Azure unit, play a vital role in the implementation of these proposed regulations. These industry leaders will need to adapt to the new compliance standards, ensuring the integrity and security of their cloud services.