In the race to AI supremacy, few things are as important as having access to advanced computer chips. The United States and China are currently vying for the top spot, so it makes sense to implement rules to prevent China from obtaining these chips. Importantly, these rules must be robust enough to prevent loopholes. With unfettered access to cloud resources from Big Tech companies like Google and Amazon, the Chinese government and the companies under its control can access America’s advanced AI technology despite rules aimed at preventing them from doing so. The AI cloud loophole must be closed immediately.
China is banned under U.S. export controls from buying Nvidia’s most advanced AI chips, but not from renting them from cloud computing companies like Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure. The Commerce Department designates cloud computing as a service rather than a product, so export rules imposed by the Biden administration on product shipments to China fail to account for this glaring vulnerability.
Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo vocalized her concerns around this vulnerability back in January, around the same time a proposed rule was released from the Commerce Department focused on requiring providers of cloud services to identify and track foreign customers in order to “deter” malicious cyber activities. Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas, who chairs the U.S. House of Representatives’s Foreign Affairs Committee, has reiterated the concern in Washington around this “loophole” and says, “[W]e are long overdue to address it.”
This week, legislation sponsored by Rep. Michael Lawler of New York aimed at ending this loophole passed the House with bipartisan support, but so far it has not gained much traction in the Senate. A spokesperson said that the Commerce Department is “seeking additional resources to strengthen our existing controls that restrict PRC companies from accessing advanced AI chips through remote access to cloud computing capability.”
Big Tech is more than happy to accommodate these requests from the Chinese if there is a profit to be made. The founder of a Shenzhen-based AI startup was easily offered access to Nvidia chips in overseas servers from both Google and Microsoft. Google seems to think that these business dealings are permitted under U.S. export controls, as no data centers reside within China proper.
AWS ranks sixth in cloud providers for the Chinese market. Through an intermediary, Shenzhen University was able to use AWS and get access to Nvidia’s chips for an “unspecified project.” Amazon claims it “complies with all applicable U.S. laws, including trade laws, regarding the provision of AWS services inside and outside of China.” Multiple other organizations linked to the Chinese government were discovered actively seeking access to these chips through cloud services.
When Nvidia modified its advanced chips in order to sell them in China, the Biden administration released new rules that would halt these sales. Through the AI cloud loophole, China is still able to maintain its unauthorized access. China is aware of the United States’ ability to cut off this access, but until the right steps are taken to materialize these threats, America’s greatest adversary will continue to mooch off American technology.
Access to these chips is vital for continued growth of Chinese AI capabilities. At one point before the initial restrictions were put in place on China, Nvidia accounted for 95 percent of the nation’s chip sales. Part of the dominance is explained by the performance of the chips. Another reason is the CUDA software that they run on. This software helps create parallelized software which is key in AI development.
The United States and China are locked in a heated battle for AI supremacy that will greatly impact the future global order. The current restrictions on advanced chip shipments to China that do not account for access to cloud services with those same chips are failing to meet the seriousness of this issue. To close this loophole, legislation such as the Remote Access Security Act should be passed by the Senate, and Commerce Department rulings should be updated to prohibit backdoor Chinese access to these chips. It is time to close the AI cloud loophole.
Caleb Larson is a cybersecurity researcher, policy analyst with the Internet Accountability Project, Heritage Foundation alum, and contributor at The Federalist, where he writes about cybersecurity-related issues facing the United States.
The post Close the AI Cloud Loophole appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.
Leave a Comment