Chinese authorities made their first public arrest related to ChatGPT last week, accusing a citizen of using AI to fabricate false reports of a fatal train crash.
Authorities arrested the man, identified as Han Hong Moumou, on Friday. Police say they used ChatGPT to compile reports of a train crash that killed nine people in northwest China’s Gansu province, even though no such crash occurred.
Cyber police began investigating the matter when articles about the alleged crash began appearing online on April 15. They were able to track posts on Han’s social media company based in the southern city of Shenzhen.
Han faces charges of “fixing fights and causing trouble”, which carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison.
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The incident comes just weeks after China’s Cyberspace Administration proposed new rules that would force bots like ChatGPT to comply with the country’s existing censorship regime. Chatbot creators will also need to make sure their bots respect the intellectual property in their creations and won’t lie.
Critically, developers will also have to register their AI algorithm with the government and prevent their AI from providing any information that undermines “state power” or national unity, according to the Wall Street Journal.
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China’s aggressive approach comes as governments around the world grapple with how or whether to regulate the emergence of AI systems. The European Union has already proposed an Artificial Intelligence Act to do so, but US lawmakers have yet to introduce any major legislation.
However, the US has tried to hinder China’s ability to develop effective AI, banning the sale of AI accelerator chips to Chinese companies. Chips are a key component to developing bots of ChatGPT caliber and even higher.