Samsung Electronics Co is banning employee use of popular generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools such as ChatGPT after discovering staff uploaded sensitive code to the platform, dealing a setback to the spread of such technology in the workplace.
The Suwon, South Korea-based company notified staff at one of its biggest divisions on Monday about the new policy in a memo reviewed by Bloomberg News.
The company is concerned that data transmitted to such AI platforms including Google Bard and Bing is stored on external servers, making it difficult to retrieve and delete, and could end up being disclosed to other users, the document said.
Photo: AFP
The company conducted a survey last month about the use of AI tools internally and said that 65 percent of respondents believe that such services pose a security risk.
Earlier last month, Samsung engineers accidentally leaked internal source code by uploading it to ChatGPT, the memo said.
It is unclear what the information encompassed.
“Interest in generative AI platforms such as ChatGPT has been growing internally and externally,” Samsung told staff. “While this interest focuses on the usefulness and efficiency of these platforms, there are also growing concerns about security risks presented by generative AI.”
Samsung is just the latest big company to express concern about the technology.
In February, only a couple of months after OpenAI’s chatbot service stirred up a storm of interest in the technology, some Wall Street banks including JPMorgan Chase & Co, Bank of America Corp and Citigroup Inc either banned or restricted its use.
The new Samsung rules ban the use of generative AI systems on company-owned computers, tablets and phones, as well as on its internal networks. They do not affect the company’s devices sold to consumers, such as Android smartphones and Windows laptops.
Samsung asked employees who use ChatGPT and other tools on personal devices to not submit any company-related information or personal data that could reveal its intellectual property. It warned that breaking the new policies could result in being fired.
In the meantime, the company is creating its own internal AI tools for translation and summarizing documents as well as for software development. It is also working on ways to block the upload of sensitive company information to external services.
“HQ is reviewing security measures to create a secure environment for safely using generative AI to enhance employees’ productivity and efficiency,” the memo said. “However, until these measures are prepared, we are temporarily restricting the use of generative AI.”
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