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Rajeev Chandrasekhar addressing a press conference at BJP HQ, on February 7, 2024 in New Delhi, India.
A warning from India
Rajeev Chandrasekhar, India’s minister of state for electronics and information technology accused Google’s Gemini chatbot of breaking numerous media-related laws. Chandrasekhar, a member of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party, replied to an X user who showed chat logs with the bot where it pointed out that some experts think Modi’s policies are “fascist.” That determination, it said, was based on the BJP’s “Hindu nationalist ideology, its crackdown on dissent and its use of violence against religious minorities.”
“These are direct violations of Rule 3(1)(b) of Intermediary Rules (IT rules) of the IT act and violations of several provisions of the Criminal code,” the minister posted in response to the screen shot.
India has been keen to invest in AI and court major technology companies, but it’s also considered hardline stances when the technology poses a problem for its leaders. For example, it recently weighed forcing WhatsApp to break encryption and identify the creator of deepfake videos of Modi.
Meanwhile, Chandrasekhar’s outburst over a mere synopsis of expert opinion is an important reminder that governments will try to control speech – not just of news and social media companies, but also generative AI. We’re watching for whether AI companies will try to appease local leaders and achieve global scale by self-censoring their products on political issues.