Chinese researchers affiliated with the People's Liberation Army (PLA), the military wing of China's ruling party, reportedly used Meta's “open” AI to develop a tool for defense applications.
Accordingly According to Reuters, Chinese researchers, including two affiliated with a People's Liberation Army research and development group, used Meta's Llama 2 AI model to create a military-focused chatbot. The chatbot, called ChatBIT, is meant to gather and process information and Reuters reports, in addition to provide information for operational decision-making.
Meta told Reuters in a press release that use of the “sole and outdated” Llama model – Llama 2 is a couple of yr old – was “unauthorized” and violated its acceptable use guidelines. Reuters says it has not been able to verify ChatBIT's capabilities or computing power.
The report provides a number of the first evidence that China's military has attempted to make use of open models for defense purposes – which is bound to fuel debate in regards to the advantages and risks of open AI.
