Scared about the threat of AI? It?s the big tech giants that need reining in | Devdatt Dubhashi and Shalom Lappin

In his 2021 Reith lectures, the third episode of which airs tonight, the artificial intelligence researcher Stuart Russell takes up the idea of a near-future AI that is so ruthlessly intelligent that it might pose an existential threat to humanity. A machine we create that might destroy us all.

This has long been a popular topic with researchers and the press. But we believe an existential threat from AI is both unlikely and in any case far off, given the current state of the technology. However, the recent development of powerful, but far smaller-scale, AI systems has had a significant effect on the world already, and the use of existing AI poses serious economic and social challenges. These are not distant, but immediate, and must be addressed.

These include the prospect of large-scale unemployment due to automation, with attendant political and social dislocation, as well as the use of personal data for purposes of commercial and political manipulation. The incorporation of ethnic and gender bias in datasets used by AI programs that determine job candidate selection, creditworthiness, and other important decisions is a well-known problem.

But by far the most immediate danger is the role that AI data analysis and generation plays in spreading disinformation and extremism on social media. This technology powers bots and amplification algorithms. These have played a direct role in fomenting conflict in many countries. They are helping to intensify racism, conspiracy theories, political extremism and a plethora of violent, irrationalist movements.

Such movements are threatening the foundations of democracy throughout the world. AI-driven social media was instrumental in mobilising January's insurrection at the US Capitol, and it has propelled the anti-vax movement since before the pandemic.

Behind all of this is the power of big tech companies, which develop the relevant data processing technology and host the social media platforms on which it is deployed. With their vast reserves of personal data, they use sophisticated targeting procedures to identify audiences for extremist posts and sites. They promote this content to increase advertising revenue, and in so doing, actively assist the rise of these destructive trends.

They exercise near-monopoly control over the social media market, and a range of other digital services. Meta, through its ownership of Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram, and Google, which controls YouTube, dominate much of the social media industry. This concentration of power gives a handful of companies far-reaching influence on political decision making.