Alibaba, ByteDance and Z.ai attended meetings at which officials discussed criminal penalties for AI leaks and restrictions on funding domestic AI start-ups, sources said
By Fanny Potkin / Reuters, SINGAPORE
Chinese authorities have held meetings with top tech firms over the past month about potentially restricting overseas access to China’s most advanced AI models, including those yet to be released, three people familiar with the discussions said.The talks follow a number of steps by Beijing to keep homegrown AI technology in the country and underscore how China, like the US, is now treating cutting-edge artificial intelligence as a critical national asset that needs controls.Companies present at the talks included tech giants Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (阿里巴巴) and ByteDance Ltd (字節跳動), as well as start-up Z.ai, formerly known as Zhipu AI (智譜AI), said the people, who were not authorized to speak to the media and declined to be identified.
A woman interacts with a humanoid robot during the launch of the U1 humanoid robot produced by UWorld, a brand of UBTech Robotics, in Shenzhen, China’s Guangdong Province on June 30. UBTech has unveiled hyper-realistic human-looking androids equipped with artificial intelligence.
