Focus – WSJ: White House creates a task force to assess the risks and opportunities of AI

WASHINGTON, October 4 /ATSH-AA/ – The White House has created a task force to assess the risks and opportunities presented by artificial intelligence and to review the federal government’s role in overseeing the rapidly developing technology, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday.

The “Task Force on Superintelligence,” headed by the Director of National Intelligence, Jay Clayton, will have 120 days to prepare its findings.

It will review existing laws and possible measures Congress could take, while cooperating with the technology industry to identify risks and opportunities.

Its mandate foresees drafting plans to respond to the threats posed by advanced artificial intelligence, while avoiding regulations that could hinder innovation and competition.

The task force will also review how security breaches, cyberattacks, circumvention of model restrictions and other incidents related to artificial intelligence are reported to the government, and will recommend ways to improve the federal response within existing powers.

Its creation comes after a meeting on Tuesday at the White House between President Donald Trump and leaders of technology companies, including OpenAI president Greg Brockman, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang.

Trump said the heads of America’s largest technology companies signed a “morally binding” agreement for placing controls on artificial intelligence, including internal safety monitoring and independent external reviews of their systems.

Trump has stressed the importance of preserving U.S. leadership in this technology, while backing voluntary industry measures for safety, instead of stricter regulation by the government.