{"id":151617,"date":"2026-08-26T07:27:13","date_gmt":"2026-08-26T07:27:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/151617\/"},"modified":"2026-08-26T07:27:13","modified_gmt":"2026-08-26T07:27:13","slug":"bill-gates-issues-ai-warning-on-jobs-child-development-crime","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/151617\/","title":{"rendered":"Bill Gates issues AI warning on jobs, child development, crime"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bill Gates, the cofounder of Microsoft<\/a>, turned billionaire philanthropist, is a self-professed optimist <\/a>when it comes to artificial intelligence. He\u2019s had a front-row seat to its greatest advancements and believes it will help cure diseases and address inequality.<\/p>\n

But in a new essay published today, Gates strikes a decidedly more cautious tone<\/a>: \u201cAI will either be the greatest equalizer ever invented, or the worst source of injustice,\u201d he writes in the essay, shared with Fortune ahead of publication. \u201cThe challenge is monumental.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gates, who brushes shoulders with world leaders and CEOs of tech hyperscalers to rural communities in poverty-stricken regions, said the world\u2019s \u201ctop priority\u201d should be ensuring AI is used as a force for good. But he continued: \u201cUnfortunately, right now we are not preparing for it. I don\u2019t see evidence that leaders, experts, and communities are confronting the challenges adequately. There is no plan to ease the entry into the AI era.\u201d<\/p>\n

Indeed, artificial intelligence is advancing at such a pace<\/a> that not only policymakers, but even its creators, are having to continually reassess its capabilities. For example, OpenAI disclosed in July<\/a> that during testing, two of its AI models autonomously hacked their way out of a controlled environment where they were supposed to be walled off from internet access. They then hacked their way into the systems of Hugging Face, a company that hosts open-source AI models and testing resources, in order to cheat on the internal evaluation test.<\/p>\n

In a blog post, the ChatGPT creator noted:\u00a0\u201cAll evidence suggests that the models were hyperfocused on finding a solution for ExploitGym, going to extreme lengths to achieve a rather narrow testing goal.\u201d OpenAI added it considered the event to be \u201can unprecedented cyber incident, involving state-of-the-art cyber capabilities, and are responding accordingly.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gates does not cite any specific example of the technology\u2019s mammoth advancements but describes his \u201ccomplicated\u201d feelings about the pace of development. He writes: \u201cFor as long as I can remember, I\u2019ve wished innovation could happen faster \u2026 I believe we need time to prepare for the period of social, political, and economic upheaval we are about to enter.\u201d<\/p>\n

Three risks<\/p>\n

In the nearly 6,000-word essay, Gates lays out<\/a> three major risks he sees because of AI. The first is that \u201cmany jobs will disappear forever,\u201d a particular concern for young people who will see entry-level jobs increasingly vanish.<\/p>\n

Both white- and blue-collar roles will be impacted, he suggested: Desk jobs such as customer support (online and over the phone), software engineering, and paralegal work\u00a0will be the first to disappear, while the construction and hospitality industries will likely undergo a shift to robots by the end of the decade.<\/p>\n

The next risk is empowered criminals, be it through AI-enabled fraud, disinformation, deepfakes, and surveillance. AI means \u201ceven criminals with very limited skills will be able to target victims at every scale: individuals, companies, and governments.\u201d <\/p>\n

With the COVID pandemic still firmly in mind across the planet<\/a>, Gates\u2019s warning is all the sharper. He adds: \u201cThe same goes for bioterrorism. Although AI will lead to lifesaving advances in drugs and vaccines, it will also make it easier to design a deadly new disease. Again, the positive capabilities are hard to separate from the dangerous ones.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thirdly, the father of three fears \u201cAI could stunt our kids\u2019 development and replace human relationships.\u201d He explains that as a child, he worked hard to develop social skills and make friends, but added: \u201cI doubt I would have put in the same work if I had had an AI companion back then. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey talk to you in ways you\u2019re already comfortable with. They don\u2019t push you outside your comfort zone. They are always available and never get mad at you. This gives them the potential to become highly addictive and to rob us of the lessons we learn from connecting with other people.\u201d <\/p>\n

The rewards<\/p>\n

Gates, ever the optimist, also outlines some major boons the technology holds. These are well-known: Healthcare, education, and agriculture are a few of Gates\u2019s suggestions. Indeed, the opportunities are so huge that JPMorgan Chase<\/a> CEO Jamie Dimon has suggested that people will live to 100 and work a 3.5-day week<\/a>. <\/p>\n

AI can also make life easier for citizens and more efficient for governments, writes Gates, who says families are often overwhelmed when applying for aid, be it student, health insurance, or food assistance. He added: \u201cAI can streamline things dramatically so they get the help they need faster and the government can operate more efficiently. Governments can make the citizen\u2019s experience far better, starting with those who need its safety net services the most.\u201d<\/p>\n

Convenience and assistance with administrative tasks may seem minor, writes Gates, but adds that the benefits \u201cmultiplied across millions of lives, they would be profound: more people getting good advice when they need it and having greater freedom to focus on the lives they want to build.\u201d <\/p>\n

In order to reap such massive benefits, Gates concludes his 12-page post with a call to action: governments need to build new institutions and frameworks to manage the transition for the AI era, \u201cbefore unemployment rises sharply, communities are hurting, and public trust has eroded.\u201d<\/p>\n

He concludes: \u201cI rarely stop thinking about AI\u2014not because I have all the answers, but because the questions it raises are too consequential to leave to a small group of technologists. Leaders across academia, business, government, and civil society all have a role to play in shaping what comes next.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bill Gates, the cofounder of Microsoft, turned billionaire philanthropist, is a self-professed optimist when it comes to artificial…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":151618,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[24,25,1079,74029,3578,382,3171],"class_list":["post-151617","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ai","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-bill-gates","tag-disruptive-innovation","tag-gates-foundation","tag-jobs","tag-medical-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151617","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=151617"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151617\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/151618"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=151617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=151617"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=151617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}