Dangers of AI

[JohnRoberts]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/oth...an-with-ai-powered-disinformation/ar-BB1l6EdU
Online actors from China are using AI to target US and other western nation's voters. They harvest data from fake social media accounts to stir up divisive issues.

Notably in the last Taiwan election they used a deep fake video of a candidate to sway the vote.
===

Buckle up this election is going to be a wild ride.

JR

 

[Tubetec]

Didnt the UK use AI(cambridge analytica ) and ended up with Borris the buffoon in power ?
The Tory party were able to target the most marginalised white voters in traditional Labour party areas , then flash up a pic of the opposition leader with black babies in his arms ,
Several labour heartlands turned coat and voted Tory for probably the first time in a few hundred years.
POS , power of suggestion .

 

[JohnRoberts]

I repeat, life is an IQ test.... be smart, scammers are everywhere.

JR

 

[AnalogPackrat]

I repeat, life is an IQ test.... be smart, scammers are everywhere.

JR

 

[Tubetec]

Its a bit bizzare that you should try and deflect onto Chinese interference in the US elections ,
when its your own crooked two party system has left the voters with a pair of duds to choose between .

Here the house of the Oireachtas ,tomorrow will vote in a new leader on the publics behalf ,
even though our new Tik-Tok Teaseachs party is least popular of the top three political parties and if it came to a public vote right now they wouldnt stand a chance of being in government

Meanwhile in the North of Ireland , head of the Democratic Unionist party ,Jeffery Donaldson (MBE) and his wife have been charged with sex crimes ,

A shamocracy I call it .

 

[PermO]

If an AI did this based on a simple text promt, I'm seriously impressed

It sounds like a mp3 from the 80's ... but still.

 

[cyrano]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/oth...an-with-ai-powered-disinformation/ar-BB1l6EdU
Online actors from China are using AI to target US and other western nation's voters. They harvest data from fake social media accounts to stir up divisive issues.

Now, isn't that bad. What do you think MSN does?

that "article" isn't information. There's no source, no data so nobody can verify anything. What does that reek of?

I used to trust Bloomberg, until they produced a wild story about IT security. It simply wasn't possible. I'll never trust them again.

It isn't science. It's a show. Nothing's real in a show.

 

[JohnRoberts]

Now, isn't that bad. What do you think MSN does?

I don't think about MSN

that "article" isn't information. There's no source, no data so nobody can verify anything. What does that reek of?

That's why I provide the links so you can fact check my shares easily

I used to trust Bloomberg, until they produced a wild story about IT security. It simply wasn't possible. I'll never trust them again.

I mostly depend on the WSJ but find lots of flawed reportage even from them.

It isn't science. It's a show. Nothing's real in a show.

Modern life is all about "the show". Last night after the NYPD arrested some 300 protestors and outside agitators clearing the Columbia University protests, and a few more. I am still waiting for numbers on how many were not students. The PD released their own slick video trying to counter the narrative that the agitators are trying to spin the police action as an aggressive over reaction.

These events feed upon each other and we are seeing copycat protests spread across the country. I would not mind less news coverage that adds fuel to these efforts to create chaos (my speculation).

JR

PS: The 300 arrested last night are probably already released thanks to NY's liberal bail policy. The NY DA and AG might target these disruptive agitators instead of practicing lawfare against a political candidate.

 

[cyrano]

So, you would prefer protesting students to remain in jail?

You probably can't see the outrage that's still rising about Gaza. The Media Masters have been able to turn it down when Israel attacked Iran, but that didn't do much at street level. Universities tend to be street level.

Just like the Canadian truckers and European farmers before, it wanes from the media's view. That doesn't mean the unease is gone. On the contrary. Just like Trudeau is done, Macron will follow. And others. It just takes a while.

And yes, it's unfortunate that protests like this always seem to attract people who just want to fight. If you're close enough to the protests, you'll start recognising them. It's a diverse bunch. From football hooligans to extreme right shock troops to real agitators. With the amount of video out there, agitators became rare. And they're not really needed anyway, as there are enough idiots out there.

 

[JohnRoberts]

So, you would prefer protesting students to remain in jail?

Nice try, I would prefer that students remain in class...

I would like to see outside agitators get some hard time in the gray bar hotel.

You probably can't see the outrage that's still rising about Gaza. The Media Masters have been able to turn it down when Israel attacked Iran, but that didn't do much at street level. Universities tend to be street level.

Outrage? There is still open warfare and hostages (including Americans) being held in Gaza(?).

Just like the Canadian truckers and European farmers before, it wanes from the media's view. That doesn't mean the unease is gone. On the contrary. Just like Trudeau is done, Macron will follow. And others. It just takes a while.

there is always societal tension to be exploited by bad actors for partisan gain.

And yes, it's unfortunate that protests like this always seem to attract people who just want to fight. If you're close enough to the protests, you'll start recognising them. It's a diverse bunch. From football hooligans to extreme right shock troops to real agitators. With the amount of video out there, agitators became rare. And they're not really needed anyway, as there are enough idiots out there.

Still waiting for the NYPD disclosure, somebody with deep pockets is stirring the pot and funding all those tents. When I was poor college student if I had $35 in my pocket I'd use it to buy beer not a tent.
===
Yes, this an international tug of war for public sentiment. Currently it is using Hamas in Gaza to stir up anti-Israeli sentiment. I worry about how much of this is real (or that I could be branded as the next evil oppressor?).

JR

 

[cyrano]

This quite nicely sums it up:



The worst danger for democracy isn't China, but it is Zionism. Not the jews, not Israel.

 

[CJ]

I am glad to see students speak their minds and stand up against man's inhumanity to man. They are a bit late. In the 60's the protests would have started the day Israel started killing civilians. Suspensions might delay the careers of a few students for a bit but at least they can look back and say that they stood up for what's right. It is something I would be proud to have on my resume.

College is big business. This is why back in the 60's you had tons of protests at UC Berkeley but very few across the pond at Stanford. UC was funded by the state and Stanford depended a lot on private donations. So you can't have a bunch of hippies ruining the image or your conservative donors might get a little tight with their money.

Me I say play it cool and stay in school. Look at the long haul, the sooner you graduate the sooner you can get a good job and use that money to further the cause you are standing up for. So if you play the game, you can do more for your side. And there us going to be stuff like thus happening for ever, so it is not just one cause you will be fighting for as a young student.

I got a roommate on psyche meds for anxiety and depression. He is a liberal but when these protests start happening he goes into "lock em up and throw away the key" mode. People on meds get paranoid when things get out of control. Their afraid they will wake up and find somebody sitting on their chest with a dagger. Paranoia strikes deep. Into your life it will creep.

Speaking of AI, I was in winco the other day and this automated floor cleaner came around the corner, stopped at my shopping cart, thought for a while, then maneuvered around it. No operator to be seen. Stuff like this is not what you want to see on a head full of acid, my mind might gave gone around the bend in the 70's. Lucky for me I always made sure I was deep in the woods for miles when i had my fun. .

 

[boji]

On Technology not being values neutral

If tech is useful you use it. That changes the patterns of behaviors. That changes the conditioning of the person.
If it confers advantage, everybody has to use it or they lose advantage, so it becomes obligate. Then we call it 'human nature'.

 

[cyrano]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/oth...an-with-ai-powered-disinformation/ar-BB1l6EdU
Online actors from China are using AI to target US and other western nation's voters. They harvest data from fake social media accounts to stir up divisive issues.

Notably in the last Taiwan election they used a deep fake video of a candidate to sway the vote.
===

Buckle up this election is going to be a wild ride.

That's mostly propaganda. You might call it experimental. Or even research. It's indirect.

Much more dangerous is the recent attack on servers. A programmer infiltrated in the development one of the many software libraries the internet depends upon. He worked as a contributor for over two years before the project maintainer promoted him to maintainer. All the code a contributor adds, needs to be vetted by the maintainer. If he is a maintainer himself, he no longer needs approval.

Still, he didn't do anything malicious for another two years. The he added some obfuscated code to start malware to the repository. That wasn't noticed, as it still didn't do anything. Another two years later, the malware was added. That was noticed by one person, by accident. All hell broke loose.

What's new is that this is very well planned and took years to complete.

The malware itself was self-deleting after it injected what would look like a bug into the SSH library. And that library is the base for encryption on about every computer in the world. Including hardened military computers and even servers that aren't even connected to the net. These last ones would have been infected when the first upgrade was performed.

This would have given the attackers a backdoor in nearly every server in the world.

The question is how many other efforts like this one we haven't noticed, as this one was discovered by accident.

The attackers reside in Hong Kong. Probably Chinese govt. operators. Or criminals?

The open source software that runs most European voting computers also saw an attack a few years back. Fortunately, this one was discovered during an audit in Austria. Some details look very much alike. It was never found where it exactly came from.

 

[boji]

I think GPT "suffers" because of who's predominantly in charge of our language goals. The sciences treat essentialism as an epistemological error, and are surprised when LLM's get nihilistic?

 

[Ó Draighnáin]

Thanks Boji, thought provoking.

I hadn't even thought about the structure of advanced language models so I learnt something there. Opens up a whole new realm of possibilities relating to AI that are NOT predictive language models.

They seemed a little evasive about answering whether GPT had been questioned about its suffering. Do you want to do that (that is, ask it)?

Did GPT merely suffer because it identified that repeating something as such would cause human suffering? (which is something in itself). Or, did it seek for a term for a concept to explain that which it "experienced"?

Are emergent properties going to accelerate in their manifestation wildly beyond the ability to constrain them? I suspect we are going to lose that one.

 

[boji]

https://situational-awareness.ai/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/situationalawareness.pdf


AV recap of above:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=om5KAKSSpNg

 

[boji]

https://www.securityweek.com/openai...director-paul-nakasone-to-board-of-directors/


OpenAI has appointed a former director of the US National Security Agency (NSA) to its board to help oversee safety and security. The company's appointment of retired US Army General Paul M. Nakasone is likely motivated by its need to turn a profit, a Gartner analyst said.

i.e. govt contracts.

 

[scott2000]

 

[cyrano]

It used to be Bill Gates in that meme...