Chinese regulators ordered local tech giants not to provide access to ChatGPT because its responses cannot be censored. Nikkei Asia reports this.
According to “people directly briefed on the matter,” authorities told Tencent and Ant Group not only to restrict access to the chatbot, but also to report on launches of their own services.
Although ChatGPT is not officially available in China, it has sparked a frenzy among internet users and AI communities.
Critics and observers have expressed concerns that the technology was not developed in China. Some experts pointed to strict technical regulation and censorship in the PRC as obstacles to creating such chatbots.
According to Nikkei, Chinese users were able to access ChatGPT via VPN services or third-party integrations into messaging apps. Earlier, Tencent, the developer of the popular WeChat messenger, blocked some attempts to integrate the chatbot into the program.
At the same time, China’s largest English-language newspaper, China Daily, warned that OpenAI’s chatbot could be used to spread Western propaganda.
#ChatGPT can potentially amplify US disinformation campaign. An expert points out only few articles can influence the output of ChatGPT on specific questions. #MediaUnlocked https://t.co/QaYqjSjx3U pic.twitter.com/7bh9icVQvm
— China Daily (@ChinaDaily) February 20, 2023
«ChatGPT стал вирусным в Китае, но растет обеспокоенность тем, что искусственный интеллект может протянуть руку помощи правительству США в его распространении дезинформации и манипулировании глобальными нарративами в своих собственных геополитических интересах», — сказал репортер ChinaDaily Мэн Чжэ.
Another Chinese journalist Xu-Pan Yu published a video in which he asks the chatbot about Xinjiang. In response, the system quoted “reports of human rights abuses against Uyghur Muslims, including mass detention in re-education camps, forced labor, and other forms of persecution by the Chinese government.”
According to the journalist, the generated text fully aligns with U.S. talking points.
Representatives of China’s tech sector said the regulators’ ban was not unexpected.
«We understood from the very beginning that ChatGPT would never be able to penetrate China because of censorship issues, and China will need its own versions of ChatGPT,» said one of the executives of a technology company to the publication.
As reported in February, Beijing authorities said they intended to support local chatbot developers chatbots.
In January, Chinese regulators tightened the rules governing the production of deepfakes.
In September 2022, journalists reported that Chinese authorities subjected to political censorship Baidu’s ERNIE-ViLG text-to-image generator.