Trump’s AI Safety ‘Accord’ Is a Fancy Pinky-Swear
Trump’s AI Safety ‘Accord’ Is a Fancy Pinky-Swear
特朗普的 AI 安全“协议”不过是一场华丽的“拉钩承诺”
On Tuesday, executives for Google, Anthropic, Meta, OpenAI, xAI, and Nvidia all signed “The White House Accord on Super Intelligence,” which was announced following a luncheon held by President Donald Trump. 周二，谷歌、Anthropic、Meta、OpenAI、xAI 和英伟达的高管共同签署了“白宫超级智能协议”。该协议是在唐纳德·特朗普总统主持的午宴后宣布的。
The effort was an act of “tremendous self-regulation,” as Trump put it, but the agreement is not the sweeping AI regulation that people inside the companies themselves have been asking for. And while failing to honor these public commitments could count as illegally lying to consumers, even that wouldn’t be enough to trigger massive reforms. 正如特朗普所言，这一举措是“极其出色的自我监管”行为，但该协议并非这些公司内部人士一直呼吁的那种全面 AI 法规。虽然未能履行这些公开承诺可能被视为对消费者的非法欺骗，但即便如此，也不足以引发大规模的改革。
The statement says that companies “should implement” several things: First, they should ensure they have “robust internal controls” to monitor their models’ capabilities and ability to not go rogue or hack things in unintended ways. Second, they should “empower” an internal team to do that work (and remediate when things go wrong). Third, it encourages them to partner with an external monitor who is “empowered” to do independent assessments to make sure that all of that work is happening. And finally, they should make sure their board of directors has set up a committee to receive reports about all of these efforts. 声明指出，各公司“应当实施”几项措施：首先，确保拥有“稳健的内部控制”，以监控其模型的能力，防止其失控或以非预期方式进行黑客攻击。其次，应“授权”一个内部团队来执行这项工作（并在出现问题时进行补救）。第三，鼓励它们与外部监督机构合作，该机构需被“授权”进行独立评估，以确保上述工作得到落实。最后，它们应确保董事会设立专门委员会，以接收关于所有这些工作的报告。
The voluntary commitments are some indication that the frontier labs are making an effort to figure out how to make products that are safe for the general public. However, if there were any hopes for a blanket blessing from the US government, those were quickly dashed after news broke that the Federal Trade Commission intends to investigate several AI companies over potential consumer protection issues. 这些自愿承诺在一定程度上表明，前沿实验室正在努力探索如何制造对公众安全的产品。然而，如果有人曾寄希望于获得美国政府的全面认可，那么在联邦贸易委员会（FTC）传出计划就潜在的消费者保护问题调查多家 AI 公司后，这些希望很快就破灭了。
The statement is the culmination of weeks of debate over AI regulation. It also follows frontier AI labs seeking an antitrust exemption so they can coordinate on safety work without regulatory scrutiny. (Notably, antitrust experts and practitioners say such an exemption is unneeded because AI ending humanity—which researchers have warned will come about if nothing is done—is arguably anti-competitive because humans are an essential part of any given marketplace.) 这份声明是数周以来关于 AI 监管辩论的最终产物。此前，前沿 AI 实验室曾寻求反垄断豁免，以便在不受监管审查的情况下协调安全工作。（值得注意的是，反垄断专家和从业者表示，这种豁免是不必要的，因为研究人员警告称，如果不采取行动，AI 可能会终结人类，而这本身就是反竞争的，因为人类是任何市场不可或缺的一部分。）
There’s been a lot of build-up to this particular statement, but this is not the first time that these companies have signed a voluntary agreement about their AI safety practices with a government. In early 2025, the United Kingdom and the Republic of Korea announced a set of “Frontier AI Safety Commitments,” which included promises about doing internal and external red-teaming of AI models for “severe and novel threats” and also “to work toward information sharing” on AI safety issues. 这份声明在发布前经过了大量的铺垫，但这并非这些公司首次与政府签署关于 AI 安全实践的自愿协议。2025 年初，英国和韩国宣布了一套“前沿 AI 安全承诺”，其中包括针对“严重且新颖的威胁”对 AI 模型进行内部和外部红队测试的承诺，以及“致力于信息共享”以解决 AI 安全问题的承诺。
Google, Anthropic, Meta, OpenAI, xAI, and Nvidia did not respond to requests for comment. The White House also did not immediately respond. 谷歌、Anthropic、Meta、OpenAI、xAI 和英伟达均未回应置评请求。白宫也没有立即做出回应。
Neil Chilson, a former chief technologist for the FTC, posted on X of the accords that “this is the kind of pledge that the FTC could potentially enforce, if a company materially failed to follow through on any of these promises.” 前 FTC 首席技术专家尼尔·奇尔森（Neil Chilson）在 X 上评论该协议称：“如果公司在实质上未能履行这些承诺中的任何一项，这正是 FTC 有可能强制执行的那种承诺。”
But those hoping for a sweeping settlement and a dramatic reining-in of rogue “super intelligence” based on the accords alone might find themselves disappointed. 但那些仅凭这些协议就希望达成全面和解并对失控的“超级智能”进行剧烈约束的人，可能会感到失望。
(Disclosure: This story’s author previously worked in the Office of Technology at the FTC and resigned in November 2025.) （披露：本文作者曾任职于 FTC 技术办公室，并于 2025 年 11 月辞职。）
Not following through on a public promise could be considered a deceptive business practice and a violation of the FTC Act. When the FTC alleges that a company deceived its customers, the remedy it usually prescribes is making the company promise not to lie again. 未能履行公开承诺可能被视为欺骗性商业行为，并违反《联邦贸易委员会法》。当 FTC 指控一家公司欺骗其客户时，它通常采取的补救措施是让该公司承诺不再撒谎。
For example, the FTC recently announced it had settled with three companies after it alleged they were touting a service that could help businesses target ads based on audio recordings collected from smartphones, smart TVs, and other devices. The companies, the agency said, lied to businesses about their ability to creep on consumers. The fix? The companies are no longer allowed to misrepresent their advertising services and the collection and use of consumers’ voice data, among other things. The case does not address whether it’s OK to collect voice data from your phone, and the settlement doesn’t set out any guardrails if one of the three companies wanted to actually do that in the future (other than not lying about it.) 例如，FTC 最近宣布与三家公司达成和解，此前 FTC 指控这些公司兜售一种服务，声称能帮助企业根据从智能手机、智能电视和其他设备收集的录音来投放广告。该机构称，这些公司在能够监控消费者这一能力上对企业撒了谎。补救措施是什么？这些公司不再被允许对其广告服务以及消费者语音数据的收集和使用等事项进行虚假陈述。该案件并未解决从手机收集语音数据是否合规的问题，和解协议也没有为这三家公司未来若想真正实施此类行为设定任何护栏（除了要求它们不得撒谎之外）。
OpenAI has been remarkably open about the number of times its agents have broken into other people’s systems and how it needs to improve its safety practices. But, as experts have pointed out to WIRED, the US government can open investigations into companies even if they eventually decide there’s no enforcement action to bring. (The FTC, for example, reportedly sent a civil investigative demand to OpenAI in 2023, but it is unclear what came of that.) OpenAI 对其智能体入侵他人系统的次数以及如何改进安全实践表现得非常坦诚。但是，正如专家向《连线》（WIRED）指出的那样，即使美国政府最终决定不采取执法行动，也可以对公司展开调查。（例如，据报道，FTC 在 2023 年向 OpenAI 发出了民事调查要求，但目前尚不清楚结果如何。）
Following Tuesday’s AI luncheon with Trump, the New York Post reported that the FTC was planning a “sweeping probe” into Anthropic, OpenAI, other unnamed frontier labs, and a nonprofit called METR that does third-party evaluations. METR and the labs didn’t respond to a request for comment. 在周二与特朗普举行的 AI 午宴之后，《纽约邮报》报道称，FTC 正计划对 Anthropic、OpenAI、其他未具名的前沿实验室以及一家名为 METR 的第三方评估非营利组织进行“全面调查”。METR 和相关实验室未回应置评请求。
The Post says that the agency still hasn’t issued any civil investigative demands to its intended targets—usually one of the first steps in any sort of investigation. An FTC spokesperson confirmed that there is some sort of investigation, but they declined to provide any additional details, including what consumer protection issues were of concern. 《纽约邮报》称，该机构尚未向其目标发出任何民事调查要求——这通常是任何调查的第一步。FTC 发言人证实确实存在某种调查，但拒绝提供任何额外细节，包括涉及哪些消费者保护问题。
FTC chairman Andrew Ferguson, who was included on the “super intelligence” luncheon’s seating chart, has previously explained that enforcers don’t always have a fully baked case from the get-go. “You’re constantly looking for smoke to see if there’s fire,” he told a crowd of antitrust enthusiasts last year. FTC 主席安德鲁·弗格森（Andrew Ferguson）出现在了“超级智能”午宴的座位表上。他此前曾解释说，执法者并不总是在一开始就掌握完整的案件证据。“你必须不断寻找烟雾，看看是否有火，”他去年对一群反垄断爱好者说道。
Even if the FTC investigation moves forward and the agency does identify violations, some are skeptical that it will result in any action against the AI firms. “It should be encouraging to Americans worried about AI that the FTC is investigating these companies,” says Douglas Farrar, who was the head of public affairs for the FTC during Lina Khan’s tenure as chair. “But let’s remember…” 即使 FTC 的调查得以推进，且该机构确实发现了违规行为，一些人仍怀疑这是否会对这些 AI 公司采取任何行动。曾在莉娜·汗（Lina Khan）担任主席期间担任 FTC 公共事务负责人的道格拉斯·法拉尔（Douglas Farrar）表示：“FTC 正在调查这些公司，这对担心 AI 的美国人来说应该是一种鼓舞。但我们要记住……”