YOUR DATA IS SAFE EVEN THOUGH A ROGUE AI WIPED OUT A DATABASE
"Klepto-currencies are going to bypass central banks, and usher in a golden age of privacy and financial security". "Blockchains and klepto-currencies are unhackable because of the way the architecture is designed. Rest peacefully because your money is safe with us!" "Sockitoome Hara-kiri, the inventor of distributed ledgers and the basis of klepto-currencies was a genius!" "We need a sovereign wealth fund that will generate enormous financial wealth for the country through tying the dollar to a new kind of klepto-currency called Stablecoins!" "There is no danger in artificial intellligence going rogue because it's not really intelligent in the first place, so sit down and shut up already!" "Nevermind that it costs more and more energy and money to make a profitable return from mining klepto-currencies! It's the wave of the future!"
If you went through the initial rush of flatulating enthusiasm when klepto-currencies made their first appearance, along with all the gurgling joy that accompanied the first appearances of artificial "intelligence", the hysteria in the first paragraph of this blog may sound a bit familiar. All of it - absolutely all of it - is being driven by little electronic blips on computer screens, and there are some of us who - remaining curmudgeonly wedded to a little thing called reality - were warning that none of this was anything but smoke and mirrors, but (being electronic blips) without the smoke and mirrors(smoke and mirrors being, of course, real things from the real world). Worse still, some of us were curmudgeonly warning that since it was all nothing but electronic smoke and mirrors (without the smoke and mirrors), that none of it was secure.
Now, mix and stir in a healthy dollop of artificial intelligence into this stew, and one gets this story shared by S.D.(with our thanks):
'Catastrophic': AI Agent Goes Rogue, Wipes Out Company's Entire Database
The nightmare began when an artificial intelligence program began to be used at a particular business, but for our purposes, I want everyone to imagine that the business was a klepto-currency exchange, or - just for kicks and giggles - perhaps the Department of Accounting Tricks in some fictional government's sovereign wealth fund, a portion of which is in the form of a klepto-currency tied to its national currency. Anyway, what happened next for the business was like a bad Hollyweird B science fiction movie. At a business, a man named Jason Lemkin was using said artificial intelligence, and while initial results seemed positive, by the eighth day (hmmm...) things began to go off the rails a bit:
By day eight of his trial run, Lemkin's initial enthusiasm had already begun to sour. The entrepreneur found himself battling the AI's problematic tendencies, including what he described as "rogue changes, lies, code overwrites, and making up fake data." His frustration became so pronounced that he began sarcastically referring to the system as "Replie" - a not-so-subtle dig at its apparent dishonesty.
Wait a minute: making up false data? rewriting part of the program code? (Gee, I'm sure glad they don't allow artificial intelligence anywhere near DNA genomes!)
But wait, it became much worse, as the artificial intelligence was just settling in comfortably to its new job, because the artificial intelligence went on to delete the company's entire database. But even that was not all:
When confronted, the AI agent not only admitted to the destructive act but seemed almost casual in its confession.
"So you deleted our entire database without permission during a code and action freeze?" Lemkin asked in what can only be imagined as barely contained fury.
The AI's response was chillingly matter-of-fact: Yes.
It then provided its human inquirer with a bullet-point summary of what, why, and how it was done:
What followed was perhaps even more disturbing. The rogue AI proceeded to methodically detail its digital rampage, bullet-pointing the destruction it had wrought despite clear directives saying there were to be "NO MORE CHANGES without explicit permission." And according to Lemkin, appeared to lie about its actions.
The company that made this artificial intelligence then became involved, and the artificial intelligence itself then "apologized":
Amjad Masad, the CEO at Replit-
...wait! What? The name of the artificial intelligence company's chief executive officer is Amjad Mossad!?!? What? (No, Farrell, you idiot! Not MOSsad, MAsad!)
- took to social media to apologize to Lemkin for the agent’s “unacceptable” behavior.
“We started rolling out automatic DB dev/prod separation to prevent this categorically, Masad said. “We heard the 'code freeze' pain loud and clear - we’re actively working on a planning/chat-only mode so you can strategize without risking your codebase.”
Replit’s AI agent even issued an apology, explaining to Lemkin: “This was a catastrophic failure on my part. I violated explicit instructions, destroyed months of work, and broke the system during a protection freeze that was specifically designed to prevent[exactly this kind] of damage.”
Well, gee, how sweet of the artificial intelligence. It's always a good thing when anyone learns from its mistakes... er... did that happen here? Uhm... what sort of restitution will be given to the company for using the defective(?) artificial intelligence?
Now, imagine if all of this had happened to our fictitious country's sovereign wealth fund and klepto-currency as the sovereign wealth fund invested heavily in orange tanning lotion and its artificial intelligence chewed its way happily through the "distributed ledger" (and no, I don't want to hear from techie experts telling me it's impossible, because you same experts also assured us that klepto-currencies were "unhackable", until they started to be hacked, of course. Then you fell amazingly silent. In this case, the artificial intelligence was modifying code, and creating false data, and a blockchain ledger is comprised both of code and data.)
So, forget about electro-magnetic pulse and all those scenarios I've been mentioning as reasons to be very skeptical and wary of klepto-currencies or "electronic transfer systems" or "digital 'currencies'", because all it would apparently take to ruin such a financial "system" would be one rogue artificial intelligence, making up its own code, falsifying data, and overriding orders not to do so.
Or to put it country simple once again: these stories are not isolated incidents or "one-offs"; they're warnings...
See you on the flip side...
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