Breakthrough new technology could spell trouble for major companies
ChatGPT is an artificial intelligence chatbot service that has been making waves through the tech industry since its premiere last November. The service, run by a non-profit research organization called OpenAI, was created as a democratized artificial intelligence service and has virtually limitless possibilities for productivity–and for error.
OpenAI has grown its technology thanks, in part, to some very high-profile investors, including Fidelity Investments, Andreessen Horowitz, and Microsoft (MSFT) – Get Free Report, which just made its third contribution. Other well-known investors include PayPal (PYPL) – Get Free Report co-founder Peter Thiel and Tesla (TSLA) – Get Free Report and Twitter (TWTR) – Get Free Report CEO Elon Musk, who put $10 million into the project.
Concerns about the ethical use of artificial intelligence (or A.I.) have also surrounded the service. They range from the practical application of content moderation to concerns that it will put very real people working in various industries out of their jobs. And it’s not just independent creators worrying about an A.I. takeover. Google (GOOGL) – Get Free Report is on a code red alert, working quickly to create a search engine chatbot before ChatGPT becomes the preferred way to search for information.
Now it looks like Amazon (AMZN) – Get Free Report has acknowledged the popularity of ChatGPT. The e-commerce giant has now expressed concern over the way its employees might use the service.
Shutterstock
Amazon Doesn’t Want its Data Fed to ChatGPT
It appears that Amazon’s internal communications team has been encouraged not to share code or sensitive information with ChatGPT. An Amazon lawyer reportedly popped in to make the request after several employees asked if the company had an internal policy regarding the new service. Some developers had already been using the service to assist with generating code, which could lead to concerns for the company.
Any information the OpenAI system receives is then used to further train it. The more people interact with it for various uses, the more it “learns”. And that data absorption could include some of Amazon’s sensitive coding and data — which obviously could be very problematic for the company.
Earlier this week, an Amazon engineer asked the chatbot to answer interview questions for a coding position with the company. The artificial applicant got all of the technical coding questions correct, which shows just how much the service has learned about coding in its time online.
Amazon Layoffs, Freezes New Hiring
Of course, the ChatGPT fake interview is likely to be the last interview Amazon conducts for a little while. Like much of the rest of the tech industry right now, this digital warehouse company is going through a series of layoffs. Amazon paused its holiday hiring at the beginning of November after announcing a series of layoffs that would amount to roughly 3% of its corporate workforce.
Amazon’s Chief Financial Officer Brian Olsavsky pointed to inflation reaching a 40-year high. “We are preparing for what could be a slower growth period,” Olsavsky told reporters after the third-quarter earnings report was published. Amazon isn’t alone. Just about every tech company is experiencing its own series of layoffs, including OpenAI investor Microsoft and its competitor Google.
