Demis Hassabis, co-founder and CEO of Google DeepMind, wants the US government to build a new regulatory body specifically designed to police the world’s most powerful AI models. In an exclusive interview with Axios, Hassabis laid out a vision for an agency that would be funded by the AI industry itself, staffed by elite technical talent, and ultimately answerable to Washington.
The kicker: this watchdog wouldn’t just write reports. It would have the authority to screen advanced AI systems before release and, if things get dicey, coordinate an industry-wide slowdown.
What Hassabis is actually proposing
The plan calls for a “systematic” approach to AI regulation. Hassabis wants pre-release testing requirements baked into the framework, meaning companies would need to prove their models are safe before shipping them to the public.
This isn’t a sudden pivot for the DeepMind chief. Back in March 2026, Hassabis warned publicly about “race conditions” in AI development, the scenario where competitive pressure pushes labs to ship faster than they can verify safety.
