Trump says top tech firms have signed accord to 'self-police' AI development | CBC News

U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday said that he and a large group of leaders of artificial intelligence company leaders signed a voluntary accord during a White House meeting that will include internal and external reviews of the technology.

The announcement followed an extensive meeting between Trump and numerous leading executives from top tech firms. These companies are spending hundreds of billions of dollars to build out AI infrastructure, including data centres in communities across the country that have sparked grassroots, bipartisan opposition. Many of the executives gathered in Washington have called for a slowdown in the development of the technology after several hgh-profile incidents where AI agents have gone rogue.

"I will never stifle the growth of a technology that will be bigger than the Industrial Revolution," Trump said at the unveiling of an AI chatbot, America.gov, intended to help Americans navigate government services. "We can't stifle it, and we're leading by a lot."

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang sat to Trump's right at Tuesday's White House lunch, according to a seating chart the president posted on Truth Social. Musk sat to Trump's left. Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella also attended.

Other executives, particularly Huang and Zuckerberg, have downplayed concerns about runaway AI and underscored the responsibility of each company to ensure the safety of its products.

The unveiling of the AI chatbot occurred at a daylong event in Washington during which multiple Trump administration officials celebrated a "Golden Age" fuelled by what Trump insists on calling "super intelligence," rather than artificial intelligence. Secretary of State Marco Rubio highlighted that America.gov could soon be used to apply for a first-time passport fully online, without an in-person visit to a processing centre.

Speaking to reporters after the lunch with tech CEOs, Trump said there had been widespread agreement on "self-regulation" by the AI developers, "and we automatically have regulation with the Department of Justice, the FBI, all of that."

"You're going to see, data centres are going to be very popular," Trump said. If the opposition continued, Trump suggested, "they'll be forced to go overseas or other locations."

"We are pacing our progress, which includes sometimes not training a model," he said on CNBC. "We have to do these in a way where we can make very confident safety cases and claims, so that people don't have a bunch of anxiety."

Trump is 'ill-advised' about artificial intelligence, says 'godfather' of AI

Canadian-British artificial intelligence pioneer Geoffrey Hinton questioned the U.S. president's grasp of the technology when asked what he expected as Trump met with American tech executives on Tuesday.

Hinton linked the danger posed by AI today to owning a tiger cub as a pet.