Treat risks of AI as seriously as climate crisis, urges senior executive at Google

The world must treat the risks from artificial intelligence as seriously as the climate crisis and cannot afford to delay its response, one of the technology's leading figures has warned.

- Dan Milmo

Speaking as the UK government prepares to host a summit on AI safety, Demis Hassabis said oversight of the industry could start with a body similar to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Hassabis, the British chief executive of Google's AI unit Deepmind, said the world must act immediately in tackling the technology's dangers, which included aiding the creation of bioweapons and the existential threat posed by super-intelligent systems.

"We must take the risks of AI as seriously as other major global challenges, like climate change," he said. "It took the international community too long to coordinate an effective global response to this, and we're living with the consequences of that now. We can't afford the same delay with AI."

Hassabis, whose unit created the revolutionary AlphaFold program that depicts protein structures, said AI could be "one of the most important and beneficial technologies ever invented". However, he told the Guardian a regime of oversight was needed and governments should take inspiration from international structures such as the IPCC.

"I think we have to start with something like the IPCC, where it's a scientific and research agreement with reports, and then build up from there."