OpenAI Should Suspend Voice Mode
WASHINGTON, D.C. – OpenAI should suspend Voice Mode because of the serious risks that result from its deceptive anthropomorphic design, Public Citizen urged the company in a letter sent to CEO Sam Altman and Chief Technology Officer Mira Murati today.
By the company’s own accounts, Voice Mode is designed to lead users to feel as though they are interacting with a genuine human. AI systems that mimic humans can be used to impersonate real people, manipulate consumer choices, invade user privacy, and induce unearned trust.
“Your rush to disseminate this technology is dangerous, unnecessary, and inconsistent with OpenAI’s purported priority in advancing AI safety,” the letter reads. “[N]othing in what we’ve seen suggests your safety testing and outside review grapples adequately with the enormous risks Voice Mode presents. Given the stakes, we find it impossible to believe that internal testing, with limited external review, can possibly justify the massive social experiment you are poised to inflict on society.”
“Voice Mode may be the most extreme example of AI anthropomorphism in existence,” said Robert Weissman, president of Public Citizen and co-author of the letter. “Everything about Voice Mode seems designed to lure users into feeling like they are interacting with a genuine human. OpenAI’s rush to unleash this technology is dangerous, unnecessary, and inconsistent with its purported mission of advancing AI safety.”
“It’s noteworthy that Google – a for-profit company that, unlike OpenAI, isn’t governed by a non-profit with a safety mandate – consciously chose not to adopt maximally human-like voices for its AI assistant,” said Rick Claypool, a research director for Public Citizen and co-author of the letter. “If OpenAI’s Voice Mode gains traction and popularity, it will be difficult for Google and other leading AI companies to avoid releasing their own anthropomorphic AI voice assistants. There’s still time to put this genie back in the bottle, but not for long.”