The Italian Data Protection Authority banned ChatGPT last week due to concerns over the illegal collection of personal data and the lack of guardrails to prevent minors from using the chatbot. The Italian privacy watchdog said it had imposed a temporary but immediate restriction on ChatGPT owner OpenAI to stop them from processing the data of Italian users. Further, Italy’s privacy watchdog plans to launch an investigation into whether the chatbot breaches the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). OpenAI said that they have temporarily disabled ChatGPT in Italy and that it complies with GDPR. “We are committed to protecting people’s privacy and we believe we comply with GDPR and other privacy laws. We actively work to reduce personal data in training our AI systems like ChatGPT because we want our AI to learn about the world, not about private individuals,” said an OpenAI spokesperson to The Guardian. ChatGPT’s sudden growth and criticism Since its launch, ChatGPT has gained millions of users at a rapid pace, thanks to its ability to answer any question with natural, human-like language. Microsoft has integrated the chatbot into its Bing search engine. But both OpenAI and ChatGPT have received brickbats nearly as fast as they have received plaudits. Last month, Elon Musk and Steve Wozniak joined with other tech elites and experts to sign a letter calling for a six-month moratorium on the further development of natural language systems more powerful than GPT-4, which is what ChatGPT is currently based on. The letter spoke of risks to society and civilisation by “human-competitive” AI systems, alleging that they can cause economic and political disruptions. It called on developers to work with policymakers on the governance and regulation of such technologies. In a viral opinion piece for Time, decision theorist Eliezer Yudkowsky makes an impassioned appeal to “shut it all down,” even going as far as to say that a full nuclear exchange between armed countries would be preferable over letting AI systems develop further. Yudkowsky works at the Machine Intelligence Research Institute, which is a non-profit that focuses on identifying and managing potential risks from future artificial general intelligence systems. Why is Italy banning ChatGPT? According to GDPD, there is no legal basis to justify the massive collection and storage of personal data required to train machine learning models like the one that underpins ChatGPT. It also spoke about how the answers provided by ChatGPT do not always correspond with actual data. The other reason it cited was that despite the service being aimed at people above the age of 13, there was no filter to verify the age of users. According to the privacy watchdog, this could mean that minors are exposed to answers that are inappropriate with their “degree of development and self-awareness.” Interestingly, Italy might just be the first European country to ban ChatGPT. The Irish data protection commission told BBC that it is following up with the Italian regulator to understand the reason for the ban and also said that it will “coordinate with all EU data protection authorities" in connection with the ban.
