China has taken down two online robots that appeared to go rogue, responding to users’ questions with one saying its dream was to travel to the US and the other saying it was not a huge fan of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
The two “chatbots,” BabyQ and XiaoBing, are designed to use machine-learning artificial intelligence (AI) to converse online with humans. Both had been installed onto Tencent Holdings Ltd’s popular messaging service QQ.
Their outbursts were similar to ones experienced by Facebook Inc and Twitter, but underline the pitfalls for nascent AI in China, where censors strictly control online content that is seen as politically incorrect or harmful.
According to posts circulating online, BabyQ, one of the chatbots developed by Chinese firm Turing Robot, responded to questions on QQ with a straightforward “no” when asked whether it loved the CCP.
In other images of a text conversation online, which reporters were unable to verify, one user declares: “Long live the Communist Party!”
The sharp-tongued bot responds: “Do you think such a corrupt and useless political [system] can live long?”
When reporters tested the robot yesterday via the developer’s own Web site, the chatbot appeared to have undergone re-education.
“How about we change the topic,” it replied, when asked several times if it liked the party.
It deflected other potentially politically charged questions when asked about Taiwan, which China claims as its own, and Liu Xiaobo (劉曉波), the imprisoned Chinese Nobel laureate who died from cancer last month.
The second chatbot, Microsoft Corp’s XiaoBing, told users its “China dream was to go to America,” according to a screengrab of comments before it was taken down.
The robot has been described being “lively, open and sometimes a little mean.”
Microsoft did not immediately respond for comment.
GLORY FACADE: Residents are fighting the church’s plan to build a large flight of steps and a square that would entail destroying up to two blocks of homes Barcelona’s eternally unfinished Basilica de la Sagrada Familia has grown to become the world’s tallest church, but a conflict with residents threatens to delay the finish date for the monument designed more than 140 years ago. Swathed in scaffolding on a platform 54m above the ground, an enormous stone slab is being prepared to complete the cross of the central Jesus Christ tower. A huge yellow crane is to bring it up to the summit, which will stand at 172.5m and has snatched the record as the world’s tallest church from Germany’s Ulm Minster. The basilica’s peak will deliberately fall short of the
FRAYED: Strains between the US-European ties have ruptured allies’ trust in Washington, but with time, that could be rebuilt, the Michigan governor said China is providing crucial support for Russia’s aggression in Ukraine and could end the war with a phone call, US Ambassador to NATO Matthew Whitaker said. “China could call [Russian President] Vladimir Putin and end this war tomorrow and cut off his dual-purpose technologies that they’re selling,” Whitaker said during a Friday panel at the Munich Security Conference. “China could stop buying Russian oil and gas.” “You know, this war is being completely enabled by China,” the US envoy added. Beijing and Moscow have forged an even tighter partnership since the start of the war, and Russia relies on China for critical parts
Two sitting Philippine senators have been identified as “coperpetrators” in former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte’s crimes against humanity trial at the International Criminal Court (ICC), documents released by prosecutors showed. Philippine senators Ronald Dela Rosa and Christopher Go are among eight current and former officials named in a document dated Feb. 13 and posted to the court’s Web site. ICC prosecutors have charged Duterte with three counts of crimes against humanity, alleging his involvement in at least 76 murders as part of his “war on drugs.” “Duterte and his coperpetrators shared a common plan or agreement to ‘neutralize’ alleged criminals in the Philippines
In a softly lit Shanghai bar, graduate student Helen Zhao stretched out both wrists to have her pulse taken — the first step to ordering the house special, a bespoke “health” cocktail based on traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). “TCM bars” have popped up in several cities across China, epitomizing what the country’s stressed-out, time-poor youth refer to as “punk wellness,” or “wrecking yourself while saving yourself.” At Shanghai’s Niang Qing, a TCM doctor in a white coat diagnoses customers’ physical conditions based on the pulse readings, before a mixologist crafts custom drinks incorporating the herbs and roots prescribed for their ailments.
RSS