Zuckerberg discusses AI risks with Japan PM during Asia tour

Zuckerberg discusses AI risks with Japan PM during Asia tour

Mark Zuckerberg, head of US tech giant Meta, speaks to reporters at the Japanese prime minister's office
Mark Zuckerberg, head of US tech giant Meta, speaks to reporters at the Japanese prime minister's office. Photo: STR / JIJI PRESS/AFP
Source: AFP

Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg met Prime Minister Fumio Kishida during a visit to Japan, discussing the risks of generative AI, a government spokesman said Wednesday.

Zuckerberg is on a mini-tour of Asia that includes stops in Japan, India and South Korea, where he travelled on Tuesday night.

The 39-year-old mixed business with pleasure while in Japan, going skiing with his family and learning about sword-making from a master craftsman.

Zuckerberg and Kishida met on Tuesday and "discussed a broad range of topics including the status of AI's technological advancement... (and) the risk surrounding generative AI", top Japanese government spokesman Yoshimasa Hayashi told reporters on Wednesday.

Japanese media quoted Zuckerberg as saying: "We had a good, productive conversation about AI and the future of technology."

"I'm really excited for the work that is happening here in Japan," he said after the 30-minute meeting.

Read also

Apple abandons electric car plans: media

Spearheaded by OpenAI's ChatGPT, generative artificial intelligence is a technology that can conjure up text, images and audio from simple prompts in just seconds.

Its rapid development has been heralded as potentially revolutionary for everything from video games to politics -- but with negative as well as positive consequences.

Meta was one of 20 major tech firms, including OpenAI, to sign a pledge this month to crack down on AI content intended to deceive voters ahead of crucial elections around the world this year.

Tech groups had previously agreed to use a common watermarking standard that would tag images generated by AI applications such as ChatGPT, Meta's Llama, Microsoft's Copilot and Google's Gemini.

LG, Samsung meetings

Zuckerberg arrived in Seoul on a private flight on Tuesday night for the second leg of his Asia trip and is expected to meet South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, local media reported.

Read also

AI the new obsession for venture capital investing

"We are coordinating with Meta to arrange a meeting," a spokesperson for Yoon's office told AFP on Wednesday.

Zuckerberg met the CEO of consumer tech giant LG Electronics to discuss extended reality (XR) projects, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported.

Meta is collaborating with LG to develop a premium headset that will compete with Apple's Vision Pro, the Korea Economic Daily reported.

South Korean media said the Meta boss also plans to meet the head of Samsung Electronics, one of the world's biggest producers of smartphones and computer chips.

Yonhap said Zuckerberg will also hold talks with XR startups at Meta's Seoul office. The agency said he will leave for India on Thursday.

Zuckerberg will attend the lavish March 1-3 pre-wedding celebrations of the son of Mukesh Ambani, chairman of Indian oil-to-telecoms giant Reliance, reports said.

Meta, Google and others have invested billions of dollars in Reliance's digital unit Jio Platforms as it seeks to take on Amazon and Walmart in India's vast e-commerce market

New feature: Сheck out news that is picked for YOU ➡️ click on “Recommended for you” and enjoy!

Source: AFP

Authors:
AFP avatar

AFP AFP text, photo, graphic, audio or video material shall not be published, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed directly or indirectly in any medium. AFP news material may not be stored in whole or in part in a computer or otherwise except for personal and non-commercial use. AFP will not be held liable for any delays, inaccuracies, errors or omissions in any AFP news material or in transmission or delivery of all or any part thereof or for any damages whatsoever. As a newswire service, AFP does not obtain releases from subjects, individuals, groups or entities contained in its photographs, videos, graphics or quoted in its texts. Further, no clearance is obtained from the owners of any trademarks or copyrighted materials whose marks and materials are included in AFP material. Therefore you will be solely responsible for obtaining any and all necessary releases from whatever individuals and/or entities necessary for any uses of AFP material.