Nikesh Arora, CEO of Palo Alto Networks (NASDAQ:PANW), weighed in on discussions about slowing down AI development, indicating that it is a ploy by firms to gain regulatory “sympathy”.
Arora voiced his views on the ongoing debate about the potential threat of AI to humanity on CNBC’s "The Tech Download" podcast, recorded Tuesday and published Thursday. He said that the AI firms were trying to "get the sympathy of the regulators" and get a "free pass" on liability. He also called the idea of pacing AI development “unrealistic.”
The Palo Alto Networks CEO advised companies against releasing products unless they are confident of their safety. He also expressed skepticism about the ability of companies to establish a method to monitor the pace of AI development.
Arora dismissed the notion that AI could potentially wipe out humanity, stating it’s “highly unlikely” and that the probability is “extremely small.” He emphasized the importance of building safety and security measures into AI models to ensure their responsible use.
Last week, Arora reacted to Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei‘s call for an industry-wide AI slowdown on X and called it a “Ninja Move”. He argued that AI safety measures are ultimately a commercial strategy: companies can demonstrate a "duty of care" while encouraging competitors to adopt the same standards, creating an industry-wide first line of defense.
AI Safety Debate Intensifies
The debate on the pace of AI development has been a hot topic recently. Earlier in the month, Shyam Sankar, CTO of Palantir Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ:PLTR), expressed his concern over the politicization of AI safety, accusing a group known as the “Effective Altruists” of attempting a coup by deciding the pace of technological progress for everyone else.
Shortly after, Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia Corp. (NASDAQ:NVDA), also pushed back on calls for new antitrust rules that could allow AI companies to coordinate a slowdown in the development of increasingly powerful models. Huang called AI safety “a real thing” and argued that companies should not release unsafe products.
Palo Alto Unveils AI-Powered Defense
Notably, earlier this week, Palo Alto Networks launched a new Unit 42 service that uses AI models from Anthropic and OpenAI to continuously identify security vulnerabilities, test attack paths, and prioritize fixes.
The service, developed through six months of testing and over 100 customer engagements with a $17 million investment, uncovered a year’s worth of internal security exposures in just three weeks and found exposures at every customer assessed.
Shares of Palo Alto closed 0.86% down to $389.92 on Thursday. The stock dipped about 0.24% premarket on Friday. Year-to-date, the shares have surged 111.68%, as per Benzinga Pro.
Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors.
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