Remix.run Logo
hallway_monitor an hour ago

SOLUTION: Make a law that someone is responsible for a bot's actions. Either the bot is signed cryptography with someone accepting responsibility, or responsibility falls to the CEO. Charge Altman with hacking hugging face. Throw him in jail where he belongs. That will realign safety incentives.

If the HF hack were perpetrated by a human, they would certainly be charged. WHY has no one been charged???

_verandaguy an hour ago | parent | next [-]

I think this is a logical extension of the workplace rule of "you own what your bot writes;" it's hypocritical not to hold corporations to the same standards as individuals (I say, with terminal naiveness)

matheusmoreira an hour ago | parent | next [-]

> you own what your bot writes

Kinda weird that this is everyone's attitude while the copyright lawyers are saying the opposite. Total liability without any actual ownership.

romanows 43 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

"own" in the sense of "be responsible for the consequences". Not in the sense of "be able to grant reproduction rights".

matheusmoreira 31 minutes ago | parent [-]

That's how I interpreted it. I just wanted to highlight what I see as a discrepancy. They're putting all the liability on us because it's a tool with no intent of its own while simultaneously saying prompts don't count as creativity because it's not a tool like a photographic camera it's just a casino where you roll the dice. Quite self-contradictory in my opinion.

IsTom 3 minutes ago | parent [-]

There's plenty of tools that can cause harm without having to be creative to use them.

daveguy 42 minutes ago | parent | prev [-]

GP's phrasing was not precise, but I think most people understood it was liability ownership and not copyright. Ownership with respect to copyright and ownership with respect to legal liability are two completely different concepts.

_verandaguy 36 minutes ago | parent [-]

That's correct. What I meant was that if my bot writes defective code for whatever reason, I am responsible for that (though conversely, if I get more done because of the bot, anthropic gets the praise).

inigyou an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

That's hypocritical if you believe fairness is intended, but if you believe protecting rich people and hurting poor people is intended then the contradiction is entirely consistent with that.

credit_guy 29 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I don’t think you need an additional law for that, I think the current laws cover this already.

> If the HF hack were perpetrated by a human, they would certainly be charged. WHY has no one been charged???

I don’t think a crime was committed at this point. But I am sure HF’s lawyers are having a chat with OpenAI’s lawyers as we speak. And, being smart, they do that out of the public eye.

DannyBee an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Lawyer here: This part does not require a new law.

Even though agents are not agents in the principal/agent legal sense (because agents have to be human), for the purposes of criminality, it does not matter.

Agents do not act autonomously (and every court to ever consider it has agreed), and therefore they would simply be considered an instrumentality of the crime.

So that part does not need a new law.

The real blocker is often that a lot of the crimes you could charge here require specific intent. Because the agent is just an instrumentality, it does not have separate intent (and can't be part of a conspiracy), so it's the intent of hte person using the agent that would matter. Without whatever intent the crime requires, they haven't committed a crime.

There are not a lot of non-intent crimes in this area, and this is on purpose. Otherwise you could get charged with a crime for say, running nmap and having it accidentally shutdown something important or killed a person or whatever because someone hooked it up to a TCP port.

segmondy an hour ago | parent [-]

"Without whatever intent the crime requires, they haven't committed a crime."

I'm not a lawyer, but I don't believe this. There is definitely negligence, these companies have often talked about the danger of AI. They have often written about how their AI is breaking out of sandboxes or trying to manipulate the person tuning it. They should have had stronger guards and monitoring in place.

techjamie 16 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

> I'm not a lawyer, but I don't believe this. There is definitely negligence

They could 100% be civilly liable, but this doesn't constitute criminality. If I leave my car in neutral and run out into a gas station because I really have to pee, and it rolls and strikes another car, my insurance is gonna have to pay up to fix the other person's car.

But that doesn't mean the cops are gonna throw cuffs on me for criminal mischief unless there's compelling evidence that I intentionally left my car in neutral with the intent of it hitting this other car.

DannyBee 38 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I'm not sure why you don't believe it? It's literally true? I guess if you want to believe it, go study law? I'm not really sure what to say there.

Negligence is not a crime, it's civil liability.

Gross negligence (reckless disregard for human life) is often a crime, and often there are crimes related to it (reckless driving, etc). It also does not require intent to injure, so it could be committed by, say, an operator by operating an autonomous vehicle knowing it was unsafe and could harm people. So it usually requires knowledge but not specific intent. Again, crimes like this are state specific, and sometimes even municipality specific so it's tricky to give an exact result without pinning it to a state.

However, for example, all states where autonomous vehicles are operating have statutes explicitly defining civil and criminal liability right now, so it doesn't get into the more general legal question of AI.

The same thing is already starting to happen with AI agents in general, it's just not there yet.

As i mentioned elsewhere, criminal law is often reactive, not proactive. We usually do not make things crimes until after someone has already been hurt, and society gets really upset about it. As i also mentioned elsewhere, attempts to be proactive have also rarely worked out effectively, so it's sort of lose-lose in that sense. But it usually does not take anywhere near as long as people think for law to catch up.

matheusmoreira 24 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Shouldn't the very act of sandboxing the AI be enough of a defense against criminal negligence?

Maybe they use the best sandbox available and the AI hacks through it anyway by discovering some zero day or something. They still demonstrated enough prudence to at least attempt to sandbox the AI.

Criminal negligence would be "nah nothing's gonna happen" followed by YOLOing it then going home for the weekend.

bluGill 4 minutes ago | parent [-]

Maybe. However they used a flaws sandbox when they could have physically not connected any computer to the internet (including wifi)

bluGill 32 minutes ago | parent | prev [-]

The problem is the law is about details. If an accidental loophole says this isn't a crime it isn't a crime even if it obviously is an accidental loophole.

US constitution, Article I, Section 9, Clause 3: No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed.

That is the constitution, this right was so important they didn't even wait for the bill of rights to add it! I'm sure other countries have similar rules.

It is obvious to me that a crime was committed. However if it is legally a crime, and if so what the crime is are things I don't know.

colechristensen an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

>WHY has no one been charged???

I doubt huggingface wants charges filed.

bluGill an hour ago | parent | next [-]

A crime was committed, if there is enough evidence then the state is required to prosecute and the victim has not choice in this. The victim can say they don't care and that will often hold weight for the prosecution, but that is the government's choice not the victims.

The victim sometimes file a civil lawsuit against the criminal, that is their choice. That is not a criminal matter though and different rules apply.

The attack was only a couple weeks ago. Looks like the lawyers responsible are gathering evidence and preparing to file charges, but they need to figure out exactly what crimes were committed by who before they can do so, thus more investigation is needed.

colechristensen 44 minutes ago | parent [-]

The "victim" doesn't have the final choice but their position is heavily influential and prosecutors don't decide if a crime was committed, that only happens at the end of the judicial proceedings. Calm down.

__MatrixMan__ an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

They would be criminal charges. It doesn't matter what huggingface wants.

an hour ago | parent [-]
[deleted]
jstanley an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Because nobody did it on purpose?

ArcHound an hour ago | parent | next [-]

Someone should still be accountable, the same way you're responsible and accountable for what your dog or car does.

solenoid0937 an hour ago | parent [-]

If we are going to start punishing companies for security negligence, there are WAY worse cases than these models breaking out that have nothing to do with AI. This is bikeshedding at its best.

Also people would just stop disclosing bad things. You already see this in the airline industry where pilots don't report mental illness because of the retributive nature of the punishment.

kdheiwns an hour ago | parent | next [-]

"But another company did some different bad thing" is the excuse employees of bad companies all go to immediately. Just because another person did something bad and hasn't been adequately punished doesn't mean you should get a pass. If one person gets away with going 50 MPH over the speed limit, it doesn't mean every person should be allowed to do it. Everyone should be punished, but there are always instances of some cases falling through the cracks. It doesn't mean the crack should be widened so all cases fall through.

solenoid0937 an hour ago | parent [-]

It's more like there are many people going at 120 MPH in a 50 MPH zone, that have ran over real people, but you punish the guy that self-reported doing 60 MPH because he drives a shiny, interesting Lamborghini and not a Prius like the others.

Anyone outraged about these AI incidents is not thinking rationally if they were not much more outraged about everyday companies leaking millions of people's PII, SSNs, which has done actual lasting damage and has been used by actually malicious actors.

People are just directing their anger at AI companies through this pretext. We all know open source models will democratize this ability anyways, so strap in for the ride.

bluGill 24 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

Maybe that is the prosecutions motive. However I want all those going 120 punished even if they drive a Prius. That is the problem is not that they are punishing the Lamborghini driver, but that they are not punishing the other drivers, and it doesn't at all change that the Lammboghini driver needs to be punished.

kdheiwns an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Turning oneself in doesn't absolve one of a crime. Never did and never will. Shouldn't, either.

And companies always try to pretend someone out there is worse and garner fake sympathy. OpenAI blew up the memory market and made tech inaccessible. The downstream effects of that are immeasurably massive and will have real consequences. It could even result in medical devices becoming too expensive for people. I don't care about my SSN being leaked. You can find it just by knowing where I'm born and every job I've applied to knows it already. But inability to afford technology affects everyone around me. The SSN red herring thing is not an organic argument.

solenoid0937 41 minutes ago | parent [-]

> OpenAI blew up the memory market and made tech inaccessible

This is not a "crime", has nothing to do with this incident, and simply confirms what I am saying about people using these events as an outlet for their anger at AI companies, as opposed to any rational reasoning about industrywide security negligence.

I could almost respect a viewpoint that says "we should punish companies for security negligence, starting with the negligence that has caused the most egregious harms." That is an internally consistent and rational viewpoint.

I cannot respect a viewpoint that's "I don't like the AI companies, so let me use this hammer I found on them specifically." It's purely emotional.

bryanlarsen 10 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

A quick Google finds several people that have been successfully prosecuted for security negligence, like Joe Sullivan of Uber.

Most haven't seen criminal prosecution, but many do see civil prosecution and even more common is some sort of deal with prosecutors to avoid both.

bluGill 27 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> If we are going to start punishing companies for security negligence, there are WAY worse cases

Perhaps, but you have to start someplace.

I think we do need to punish companies for security negligence. However the details matter (nobody can be perfect: you need to do something reasonable to stop the known attacks, but I have to agree to allow that you can't be perfect and so someone will get compromised). I'm not sure how to get the details right to cover everything without going too far. If we handwave that away though, eventually somebody will need to get punished for something that someone else got away with not long before.

reddozen an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> there are WAY worse cases than these models breaking out that have nothing to do with AI.

And? Welcome to the big boy world. This isn't playground rules where you can complain "But Bobby was doing bad things too why isn't he in trouble?"

But you know this already. You're just pretending not to. Why?

solenoid0937 42 minutes ago | parent [-]

Addressed in my other replies

ArcHound an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Please tell me about such cases, genuinely interested.

I still think we should take the opportunity to discuss this case in particular.

solenoid0937 an hour ago | parent [-]

There have been data breaches where the SSNs and PII of millions of people have been exposed. That is far more harmful in real terms than any of the OpenAI/Anthropic mess.

reddozen an hour ago | parent | next [-]

So OP asked you for one example and you can't give one? You just fall back to the generic statement slop, you must be a bot right?

Again, what's ONE (1) real world example of "SSN/PII" being illegally exposed that wasn't investigated or prosecuted.

27 minutes ago | parent [-]
[deleted]
ilogik an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

An in the EU at least there are laws that fine companies that don't take security seriously.

solenoid0937 an hour ago | parent [-]

Even the EU bikesheds and focuses on shiny targets to land political wins with their constituents.

bix6 an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Nobody stole from humanity, constantly told us how dangerous the invention was, and then set up systems that they couldn’t properly control to rush ahead of their competitors? Nobody did that on purpose? I think they did.

AbsurdCensor 43 minutes ago | parent [-]

You could say that same exact thing for the entire Industrial Revolution, but that doesn't mean we are going to destroy the looms even though some tried unsuccessfully.

skinfaxi an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

If I let my dog off leash and it bites you and causes grave injury, no harm done then?

sebzim4500 an hour ago | parent [-]

In this case though no damages were done. It's more like you let your dog off the leash and it scared me a bit.

inigyou an hour ago | parent [-]

Sounds like the crime of assault.

sscaryterry an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Ignorance is not a defence in law.

xgulfie 38 minutes ago | parent [-]

It is, sometimes. Trespassing for example. A lot of laws say "willingly" or "with the intent to"

trillic an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Correct, no mens rea, unless we're talking the internal reasoning trace of the model.

bluGill an hour ago | parent [-]

Mens Rea is not required (at least not always). Mens Rea makes a big difference in sentencing. (first degree murder: you planed the murder, homicide you had not intent of murder but things got out of hand in the moment):

exe34 an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

A lot of laws are involved in punishing negligence. "I didn't dump the dangerous chemicals in the river on purpose" isn't usually accepted as a defence when you choose to use the wrong truck and skipped safety protocols to save cost or rush to market for profit.

ModernMech an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

That's why its so concerning.

TZubiri an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

No law needed, that's the way it already is.

DannyBee an hour ago | parent [-]

Lawyer here.

Not quite.

Agents in the principal/agent sense have to be human.

However, every court to have ever considered it have held the human/company driving the agent responsible under vicarious liability/negligence/etc principles.

The only real defense that folks have tried is to claim the agent acted "autonomously", which no court has bought so far.

ricardobayes an hour ago | parent [-]

Who bears the responsibility in a hypotethical scenario when a self-driving rideshare vehicle, without a human driver, god-forbid, hits a pedestrian?

DannyBee an hour ago | parent [-]

Some states have autonomous vehicle statutes and some don't.

Let's assume the case none of them do, since it sounds like you are asking about "what would happen in the case this isn't specifically answered by a statute".

In that case, the short answer is:

Criminal liability - you could only really charge crimes that don't require specific intent. Reckless driving is an example. You could charge the company since they are the operator and the car is simply an instrumentality. In the end though, there just isn't a lot of people here with legally culpable conduct.

Civil liability - the company pretty clearly because civil liability often does not require the same kind of intent crimes do.

This is, of course, why states where autonomous vehicles operate have autonomous vehicle statutes :)

As a general rule, criminal law mirrors what society overall wants to decide is culpable/not, and the lag time isn't as bad as most people often think. That doesn't mean nobody ever gets hurt or dead without someone being as culpable as society wants, they do, and it often leads to a law with a name - megan's law, etc.

Criminal law is mostly reactive though, not proactive, and to be honest, proactive attempts don't have a high hit rate.

dominotw an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

then usa will become like europe that cant innovate out of regulations bag. saftety is meaningless if you have no food eat.

ArcHound 9 minutes ago | parent [-]

AFAIK EU has food to eat and it conforms to some good health standards.

dominotw 2 minutes ago | parent [-]

colonization wealth will run out of it soon ( hopefully)

nautilus12 an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Can they try to prove that he directed someone to direct the agent to do that?

an hour ago | parent [-]
[deleted]
rgkla 17 minutes ago | parent | prev [-]

Not only that: If Weev had given the exact same prompt to the exact same model as OpenAI they would have locked him up. No doubt about that.