Treasury Secretary says its 'unacceptable' that Chinese open source AI models may have been built on 'IP theft'
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated that the U.S. government is probing whether Chinese AI companies are using stolen intellectual property to build their models. He emphasized that while the administration supports open-source development, it will not tolerate IP theft.
Why it matters
The threat of sanctions against Chinese AI firms signals a hardening U.S. policy toward foreign AI development and potential protectionist measures for domestic tech giants.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent Finn Gomez/Getty Images Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the US could impose sanctions on Chinese AI companies. Bessent said the US is probing whether Chinese companies "stole" intellectual property from their US competitors. Bessent said the Trump administration is not opposed to open source models but will protect AI IP. The Trump administration is signaling that it may clamp down on Chinese open-source AI models that are the talk of the industry. On Tuesday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the US government is looking into whether popular open-source AI models from Chinese-based companies stole the intellectual property of their US competitors. "There's a very technical AI word for it called distillation, but you and I would call it theft," Bessent said during an interview on Fox Business.
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