The ever more constant increase inartificial intelligence (AI) in the world has led toneed to protect this technology through regulations.
Tale regulatory requirement it was picked up by powers such as China, one of the most relevant distribution and cutting-edge realities regarding AI.
Support for innovation by controlling its risks
Beijing's approach to the regulation of artificial intelligence, in fact, is becoming more structured and complex, reflecting an attempt to balance support for technological innovation with the need to control the associated risks.
In April 2023, for example, following the meeting of the China Cyberspace Administration (CAC) were evaluated and approved the “Provisional measures for the management of generative artificial intelligence services”.
These measures, which have been scheduled to come into force in August 2023, represent an attempt to more specifically regulate generative AI applicationssuch as those that generate text, images and video content, and were aimed at guaranteeing the development of AI in terms of reliability and safety, also in reference to what foreseen by the 2021 “Next Generation Artificial Intelligence Code of Ethics”, which aims to integrate a set of general ethical principles and provide guidance to Chinese natural persons, legal entities and other institutions that are engaged in activities applicable to the entire life cycle of Artificial Intelligence systems.
Furthermore, recently, the Beijing Bureau of Economic and Information Technology released a white paper stating that China is advancing in the research and development of artificial intelligence and will continue to lead the country in related technology to innovation.
China's AI innovations
Among China's recent AI innovations, you can quote ERNIE Bot (Enhanced Representation through Knowledge Integration) an AI chatbot service product from Baidu, the leading Chinese language search engine, under development since 2019.
The chatbot in question is based on a broad language model called “Ernie 4.0”, announced on October 17, 2023, capable of understanding human intentions and providing accurate, logical and fluent responses that approach the human level.
During a press conference at Baidu headquarters in Beijing, the Company's co-founder, president and CEO, Robin Li, said introduced ERNIE Bot's comprehensive capabilities across five scenarios: literary creation, business writing, mathematical calculation, Chinese language understanding, and multimodal generation.
Strict requirements for AI vendors
Regulations issued by Beijing establish strict requirements for AI service providers, including respecting the country's fundamental socialist values, preventing discrimination and safeguarding the security of personal data. Furthermore, the transparency and reliability of generative AI services is emphasized, with specific rules for content moderation and labeling of the multimedia material produced.
An important innovation is the recent introduction of a national system for the verification and safety of AI models, with the support of third-party evaluation organizations.
This move suggests a growing commitment to effective and enforced regulation, although the operational details remain to be seen.
Overall, these measures are seen as part of a broader attempt to position China as a leader in AI regulation, balancing promoting innovation with mitigating risks to security and social stability.
Despite recent regulatory tightening, Angela Huyue Zhang, a law professor at the University of Hong Kong, predicts a relatively accommodative approach towards AI-related copyright issues, reflecting the priority given to the growth of the domestic AI sector.
How China approaches technology regulation
With regard to the regulation policy of Artificial Intelligence adopted by the Chinese government, in fact, Zhang's new book, entitled “High Wire: How China Regulates Big Tech and Governs Its Economy” illustrates how, with a view to promoting growth of the domestic AI industry, China faces technological regulation almost always following a three-phase progression: an initial accommodating approach for companies to expand and compete, sudden more stringent interventions that reduce profits and, finally, a new easing of restrictions.
This oscillation between liberalization and restriction has emerged clearly in the treatment of Chinese tech giants such as Alibaba and Tencent.
During the liberalization phase, these companies were able to expand without many restrictions, leading to an increase in their market power.
However, the Chinese government began cracking down on technology in 2020, investigating past mergers and acquisitions conducted by such companies and handing out heavy fines for antitrust violations.
Despite these rigorous interventions, scholars note that regulation has since slowed, indicating a possible truce between Chinese authorities and domestic technology companies
According to Zhang, the model adapts to almost every industry: from financial innovations like peer-to-peer lending in the mid-2010s to online teaching, which has exploded in popularity during the pandemic.
According to Zhang, AI is currently in the midst of liberalization. This technology is in fact demonstrating that the interests of the Chinese government and companies are currently closely aligned. In this sense, Artificial Intelligence is seen as crucial to achieving China's goals of technological supremacy and self-sufficiency.
Conclusions
During China's last annual parliamentary meeting in March, President Xi Jinping also coined the term “new quality productive forces,” meaning new sectors expected to counteract China's current economic slowdown. And an AI-focused campaign was explicitly mentioned in this context.
From a purely regulatory point of view, while the EU has adopted stricter regulations on AI, such as those regarding deepfakes and recommendation algorithms, China has reacted more quickly, but has presented a greater focus on the control of politically sensitive content rather than on the protection of human rights.
This can be attributed to the close relationship between the China Cyberspace Administration and the Communist Party, which has specific interests in controlling online information.
But Zhang believes these regulations are only strict when it comes to free speech and content control, areas in which the Chinese government has become increasingly strict.
Beyond that, recent regulations offer vague principles and few enforcement measures to prevent AI from causing harm, including harm to the human rights of Chinese citizens.
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