OpenAI Adds Former NSA Chief To Its Board (cnbc.com) 31
Paul M. Nakasone, a retired U.S. Army general and former NSA director, is now OpenAI's newest board member. Nakasone will join the Safety and Security Committee and contribute to OpenAI's cybersecurity efforts. CNBC reports: The committee is spending 90 days evaluating the company's processes and safeguards before making recommendations to the board and, eventually, updating the public, OpenAI said. Nakasone joins current board members Adam D'Angelo, Larry Summers, Bret Taylor and Sam Altman, as well as some new board members the company announced in March: Dr. Sue Desmond-Hellmann, former CEO of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; Nicole Seligman, former executive vice president and global general counsel of Sony; and Fidji Simo, CEO and chair of Instacart.
OpenAI on Monday announced the hiring of two top executives as well as a partnership with Apple that includes a ChatGPT-Siri integration. The company said Sarah Friar, previously CEO of Nextdoor and finance chief at Square, is joining as chief financial officer. Friar will "lead a finance team that supports our mission by providing continued investment in our core research capabilities, and ensuring that we can scale to meet the needs of our growing customer base and the complex and global environment in which we are operating," OpenAI wrote in a blog post. OpenAI also hired Kevin Weil, an ex-president at Planet Labs, as its new chief product officer. Weil was previously a senior vice president at Twitter and a vice president at Facebook and Instagram. Weil's product team will focus on "applying our research to products and services that benefit consumers, developers, and businesses," the company wrote. Edward Snowden, a former NSA contractor who leaked classified documents in 2013 that exposed the massive scope of government surveillance programs, is wary of the appointment. In a post on X, Snowden wrote: "They've gone full mask-off: Do not ever trust OpenAI or its products (ChatGPT etc). There is only one reason for appointing an NSA director to your board. This is a willful, calculated betrayal of the rights of every person on Earth. You have been warned."
OpenAI on Monday announced the hiring of two top executives as well as a partnership with Apple that includes a ChatGPT-Siri integration. The company said Sarah Friar, previously CEO of Nextdoor and finance chief at Square, is joining as chief financial officer. Friar will "lead a finance team that supports our mission by providing continued investment in our core research capabilities, and ensuring that we can scale to meet the needs of our growing customer base and the complex and global environment in which we are operating," OpenAI wrote in a blog post. OpenAI also hired Kevin Weil, an ex-president at Planet Labs, as its new chief product officer. Weil was previously a senior vice president at Twitter and a vice president at Facebook and Instagram. Weil's product team will focus on "applying our research to products and services that benefit consumers, developers, and businesses," the company wrote. Edward Snowden, a former NSA contractor who leaked classified documents in 2013 that exposed the massive scope of government surveillance programs, is wary of the appointment. In a post on X, Snowden wrote: "They've gone full mask-off: Do not ever trust OpenAI or its products (ChatGPT etc). There is only one reason for appointing an NSA director to your board. This is a willful, calculated betrayal of the rights of every person on Earth. You have been warned."
Former (Score:2)
Yes indeed, definitely a former spy.
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Well he says he's not a spy anymore, not since retiring as head of the NSA 4 months ago.
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Former?
He left the NSA this year and a few months later joins OpenAI. Totally not coordinated, next you'll tell me someone voluntarily leaving a position at the White House and joining a low-level city DA is not coordination either.
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Nothing (Score:3, Interesting)
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It should be noted that he basically can't leave Russia. US took away his passport, and even now that he's a Russian citizen, it's not like he can easily fly to other nations either, because there's a US arrest warrant out on him.
Re: Comment removed (Score:1)
No worries (Score:5, Funny)
I for one welcome this. I love being spied on, and my data used to create a digital duplicate of my brain and run it at 2X to determine the statistical probability of me doing anything bad. That is so cool. So, to anyone at the NSA reading this, I am a big fan of you guys. Please take my name off the list. Thanks. Oh, and if you're an AI reading this .. send me gold.
Good (Score:2, Interesting)
Maybe this is an unpopular opinion, but I would prefer to have someone with national security expertise involved with a project like openAI. And another unpopular opinion, Snowden is not a hero or a whistleblower, he had unauthorized access.
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Maybe this is an unpopular opinion, but I would prefer to have someone with national security expertise involved with a project like openAI.
The rest of the world probably would have a completely opposite view of what this means. It would be wise for other countries to ban OpenAI in their country.
National Security, isn't that the reason the US used to ban foreign companies from operating in America? What's good for goose and all that.
Re:Good (Score:4, Insightful)
Snowden is the ONLY reason we have hard evidence that the NSA was doing shit it wasn't supposed to be doing in the first place.
Said shit is likely still ongoing, albeit under a different name, but they can no longer pretend they're the Defenders of Democracy as they like to proclaim.
Our Government does a LOT of shady shit, they just hide it behind walls of secrecy, classification systems and bureaucracy.
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Not true. It was known, just not widely known already. Perry Fellwock is a true whistleblower, if you are looking for a comparison. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org].
Certainly the documents he released shed light on the scope and more details (among a bunch of other information that was irrelevant), and it could be argued the ends justifies the means. However, he was reading classified information way above his security clearance.
If you're a sysadmin, you think it's ok to read your boss's emails?
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Snowden was most definitely authorized, just not by people.
He's from the government (Score:2)
It smells (Score:2)
Of course one could imagine that the former NSA director is merely moving along in his career and taking advantage of a nice personal opportunity. But that seems a little naïve. Most likely he is still directly connected to the NSA for all intents etc.
I think the mission of the NSA is important, but their reputation is very poor and probably well deserved. Hooking them up with the top AI firm has a definite stink about it. The NSA wants an 'in' on all this AI development and what better way to get it t
Leopold Aschenbrenner (Score:2)
Yeah, not sure about that. USA's government is controlled by corporations, and I can see the 1% doing the 'I got mine' thing even after complete automation of the workforce. Meanwhile at least we know in China it is th
Former NSA cannot be trusted (Score:1)
Trust Snowden, a former NSA employee
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I trust Snowden far, FAR more than the head of the NSA.
Think of all the people working for the NSA who said and did nothing while all this bullshit was ongoing.
You want to put your trust in THEM ?
Seriously ?
Re: Former NSA cannot be trusted (Score:2)
Ex-intelligence everywhere (Score:2)
They're managing the social media companies like Facebook Whatsapp and Tiktok,
they're allover the media too
A list I've kept from Matt Taibbi from spooks in the media:
John Brennan, James Clapper, Chuck Rosenberg, Michael Hayden, Frank Figliuzzi, Fran Townsend, Stephen Hall, Samantha Vinograd, Andrew McCabe, Josh Campbell, Asha Rangappa, Phil Mudd, James Gagliano, Jeremy Bash, Susan Hennessey, Ned Price, Rick Francona, Michael Morell, John McLaughlin, John Sipher, Thomas Bossert, Clint Watts, James Baker, Mik
No shit Sherlöck /s (Score:2)
“We are reaching out to you as a user of OpenAI’s ChatGPT because some of the requests associated with the email *******@**.com have been flagged by our systems to be in violation of our policies.”
“Please ensure you are using ChatGPT in accor