The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has announced the establishment of the Artificial Intelligence Safety and Security Board, which will consider ways to promote the safe and secure use of AI technology in U.S. critical infrastructure.
The board features top execs from several AI and tech companies, plus White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director Arati Prabhakar.
The board will provide recommendations to Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas; the critical infrastructure community including pipeline and grid operators; and other private sector stakeholders on how to responsibly leverage AI technologies.
Creation of the board is a requirement stemming from President Biden’s AI executive order issued in late October 2023, which directed Mayorkas to establish the board to support the responsible development of AI. The board consists of 22 members from a range of sectors, including from industry, academia, and government.
“Artificial Intelligence is a transformative technology that can advance our national interests in unprecedented ways. At the same time, it presents real risks – risks that we can mitigate by adopting best practices and taking other studied, concrete actions,” Secretary Mayorkas said in an April 26 press release.
“I am grateful that such accomplished leaders are dedicating their time and expertise to the Board to help ensure our nation’s critical infrastructure – the vital services upon which Americans rely every day – effectively guards against the risks and realizes the enormous potential of this transformative technology,” he added.
The board will meet for the first time in early May with subsequent meetings planned quarterly.
DHS is responsible for the overall security of the nation’s critical infrastructure, and it said this board will help to ensure the safe and responsible deployment of AI technology in critical infrastructure for years to come.
The board’s inaugural members include:
- Sam Altman, CEO, OpenAI;
- Dario Amodei, CEO and co-founder, Anthropic;
- Ed Bastian, CEO, Delta Air Lines;
- Rumman Chowdhury, Ph.D., CEO, Humane Intelligence;
- Alexandra Reeve Givens, president and CEO, Center for Democracy and Technology
- Bruce Harrell, mayor of Seattle, Washington; chair, Technology and Innovation Committee, United States Conference of Mayors;
- Damon Hewitt, president and executive director, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law;
- Vicki Hollub, president and CEO, Occidental Petroleum;
- Jensen Huang, president and CEO, NVIDIA;
- Arvind Krishna, chairman and CEO, IBM;
- Fei-Fei Li, Ph.D., co-director, Stanford Human-centered Artificial Intelligence Institute;
- Wes Moore, governor of Maryland;
- Satya Nadella, Chairman and CEO, Microsoft;
- Shantanu Narayen, chair and CEO, Adobe;
- Sundar Pichai, CEO, Alphabet;
- Arati Prabhakar, Ph.D., assistant to the president for science and technology; director, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy;
- Chuck Robbins, chair and CEO, Cisco; chair, Business Roundtable;
- Adam Selipsky, CEO, Amazon Web Services;
- Lisa Su, chair and CEO, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD);
- Nicol Turner Lee, Ph.D., senior fellow and director of the Center for Technology Innovation, Brookings Institution;
- Kathy Warden, chair, CEO and president, Northrop Grumman; and
- Maya Wiley, president and CEO, The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights.
“AI is one of the most powerful technologies of our time. President Biden has made clear that we must manage AI’s risks so that we can seize its benefits,” Prabhakar said. “Thanks to Secretary Mayorkas for taking action to protect America’s critical infrastructure – our energy system, banking, health care, and communications – from AI risks and harms.”
The launch of the board comes about a month after DHS debuted its first-ever AI Roadmap, which details the agency’s AI plans for 2024.
