Thousands of US AI Company Employees Sign Open Letter Seeking to Establish a Mechanism for Coordinated Slowdown of Frontier AI Development

TechFlow news, on July 29, 1,132 employees from frontier AI companies (including OpenAI, Meta, Google, and Anthropic, etc.) released a joint statement. The statement pointed out that AI could create a far better future, but this outcome is not set in stone. Leading AI enterprises currently believe that the automation of AI research and development is just around the corner. Although the specific degree of acceleration is difficult to predict, a real risk is approaching; rapid breakthroughs in AI capabilities may cause its evolution speed to exceed the scope of human understanding and control. To unlock AI's true potential, industry, government, and society urgently need to win a time window to address emerging risks, build security defenses, and strengthen regulatory frameworks. However, every company and even every country faces the competitive dilemma of "daring not to slow down alone." Currently, the world lacks effective tools from technology to governance levels to prudently regulate the overall development pace of frontier AI. The statement calls on the U.S. government, based on existing monitoring mechanisms for frontier model releases, to promote an international collaboration to develop necessary technical and governance means to prudently guide the process of automated AI research and development.

OpenAI Chief Scientist Jakub Pachocki, OpenAI Chief Research Officer Mark Chen, Anthropic Co-founder and Chief Science Officer Jared Kaplan, Meta Chief Scientist Shengjia Zhao, and others all signed the statement. Google Research Scientist Stephanie Chan stated, "I signed this statement in my personal capacity because I support having greater 'optionality' within the range of actionable measures to ensure that societies and governments around the world have time to deliberate and prepare and adjust for this powerful technology." (Jin10)