Amazon Exec: AI Regulation Curbs Progress

Amazon and AWS Chief Security Officer Steve Schmidt told Bloomberg News Tuesday (June 10) that government involvement in artificial intelligence (AI) could limit the scope of the company’s work in that field.

According to the report, Schmidt said that regulation “tends to retard progress.” He added that Amazon tends to focus on standards and allowing the industry and its customers to determine the right standards.

Schmidt’s comments came as the U.S. Senate considers whether to keep a provision in President Donald Trump’s tax package that forbids states from enforcing new AI rules, the report said. Because Senate rules require tax packages to be budgetary, the Senate has proposed denying federal funding for broadband internet projects to states that enforce AI regulations, per the report.

According to reports, Trump had rescinded the Biden administration’s executive order on AI. PYMNTS reported Jan. 22 that Trump repealed Biden’s AI regulations on his first day in office, which signaled a policy shift that favors growth and innovation over regulations and guardrails. Biden’s executive order would have required the federal government to vet the advanced AI models of major developers, such as Amazon, OpenAI and Google. It also would have established chief AI officers in major federal agencies and set out frameworks that addressed ethical and security risks.

PYMNTS reported May 21 that the proposed 10-year freeze on state-level regulation of AI that is included in the tax and spending bill includes carveouts for state measures that “remove legal impediments” or “facilitate the deployment or operation” of AI systems, as well as laws that “streamline licensing, permitting, routing, zoning, procurement or reporting procedures.” It would also allow state laws that do not impose any substantive requirements on AI systems.

Tech industry leaders have said that a national framework is needed to avoid a patchwork of conflicting rules. Critics of preemption have said that Congress has failed to pass meaningful legislation on AI, leaving states to fill the gap.