Posting on X about the recent news that Apple will be working with Chat GPT creator Open AI to put its AI program on Apple products moving forward, X owner and Tesla CEO Elon Musk alleged that the artificial intelligence news is not just something that means another useless product will be on phones, but is an “unacceptable security violation.”
As background, OpenAI has made one of the more popular and useable artificial intelligence products, with Chat CPT taking the world by storm and later iterations of it, like GPT-4, being even more impressive. It will now be working with Apple to embed AI services in Apple products, such as by improving Siri, assisting with writing, and other things. That Apple AI product is called “Apple Intelligence.”
Tim Cook announcing the news, said, “We’re thrilled to introduce a new chapter in Apple innovation. Apple Intelligence will transform what users can do with our products — and what our products can do for our users.” He continued, “Our unique approach combines generative AI with a user’s personal context to deliver truly helpful intelligence. And it can access that information in a completely private and secure way to help users do the things that matter most to them. This is AI as only Apple can deliver it, and we can’t wait for users to experience what it can do.”
Elon sounded off on that news on X, alleging that the data transfer that he thinks could occur poses a massive security threat. He alleged, “It’s patently absurd that Apple isn’t smart enough to make their own AI, yet is somehow capable of ensuring that OpenAI will protect your security & privacy! Apple has no clue what’s actually going on once they hand your data over to OpenAI. They’re selling you down the river.”
A community note on Elon’s post that has since disappeared added that Apple has created “Apple Intelligence,” its own AI program, and that Open AI’s ChatGPT, though added, was an “additional feature within Apple Intelligence, is limited to Siri and Writing Tools and will require permission from the user for every use.”
That wasn’t all. In other posts, he noted that his companies would have to take further security precautions, saying, “If Apple integrates OpenAI at the OS level, then Apple devices will be banned at my companies. That is an unacceptable security violation” and “And visitors will have to check their Apple devices at the door, where they will be stored in a Faraday cage.”
Commenting on Elon’s posts, people had mixed reactions. Some called on Elon to created a phone without such issues, saying things like, “Build a Tesla phone, Elon … you must have already thought of it & many Apple users will be looking for an off ramp.” Others accused Elon of causing similar security issues to Apple, if not more severe ones, by requiring people to submit identification to get verified on X. Still others noted that the Open AI integration is not at the operating system level, so it is less of a security issue than he made it sound.
Watch Apple CEO Tim Cook describe how the AI integration will work here:
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