OpenAI illegally blocked staff from sharing dangers, whistleblowers say

OpenAI had its employees sign agreements requiring them to waive their federal rights to whistleblower compensation, the letter said. Those agreements also required OpenAI employees to obtain prior consent from the company if they wanted to disclose information to federal authorities. OpenAI did not create exemptions in its employee non-disparagement clauses for disclosure of securities violations to the SEC.

These overly broad agreements violate longstanding federal laws and regulations intended to protect whistleblowers who wish to reveal damning information about their companies anonymously and without fear of retaliation, the letter says.

“These contracts sent a message: We don’t want our employees talking to federal regulators,” said one of the whistleblowers, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation. “I don’t think AI companies can create technology that is safe and in the public interest if they shield themselves from scrutiny and dissent.”

In a statement, OpenAI spokesperson Hannah Wong said: “Our whistleblower policy protects employees’ right to make protected disclosures. Additionally, we believe that a robust debate about this technology is essential and have already made significant changes to our offboarding process to remove non-disparaging language.”

The whistleblowers’ letter comes amid concerns that OpenAI, which began as a OpenAI, a nonprofit with an altruistic mission, prioritizes profit over security in creating its technology. The Post reported Friday that OpenAI rushed the release of its latest AI model that powers ChatGPT to meet a May release date set by company executives, despite concerns from employees that the company “failed” to adhere to its own security testing protocol that it said would protect its AI from catastrophic harm, such as teaching users to build bioweapons or helping hackers develop new types of cyberattacks. In a statement, OpenAI spokeswoman Lindsey Held said the company “did not skimp on our security process, even as we acknowledge the launch was stressful for our teams.”

Tech companies’ strict confidentiality agreements have long vexed workers and regulators. During the #MeToo movement and nationwide protests in response to the killing of George Floyd, workers have warned that such legal agreements limit their ability to report sexual misconduct or racial discrimination. Regulators, meanwhile, worry that such terms could silence tech employees who might alert them to misconduct in the dark. the tech sector, particularly amid allegations that the companies’ algorithms favor content that harms elections, public health and children’s safety.

The rapid advancement of artificial intelligence has accentuated Policymakers’ concerns about the power of the tech industry have sparked a flood of calls for regulation. In the United States, AI companies operate largely in a legal vacuum, and policymakers say they can’t effectively create new AI policies without the help of whistleblowers, who can help explain the potential threats posed by the rapidly evolving technology.

“OpenAI’s policies and practices appear to have a chilling effect on whistleblowers’ rights to speak out and receive appropriate compensation for their protected disclosures,” Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said in a statement to the Post. “For the federal government to stay ahead of artificial intelligence, OpenAI’s confidentiality agreements must change.”

A copy of the letter, addressed to SEC Chairman Gary Gensler, was sent to Congress. The Post obtained the whistleblower letter from Grassley’s office.

The official complaints mentioned The letters were sent to the SEC in June. Stephen Kohn, an attorney representing the OpenAI whistleblowers, said the SEC has responded to the complaint.

It was not immediately clear whether the SEC had launched an investigation. The agency did not respond to a request for comment.

The SEC must take “swift and aggressive” action to address these illegal agreements, the letter said, because they could be relevant to the broader AI industry and could violate the White House’s October executive order requiring AI companies to develop the technology safely.

“At the heart of any such implementation effort is the recognition that insiders … must be free to report their concerns to federal authorities,” the letter states. “Employees are best positioned to detect and prevent the types of dangers mentioned in the executive order and are also best positioned to help ensure that AI benefits humanity, rather than having the opposite effect.”

According to Kohn, the agreements threatened employees with criminal prosecution if they reported violations of trade secret laws to federal authorities. Employees were instructed to keep company information confidential and were threatened with “severe penalties” without recognition of their right to report the information to the government.

“In terms of AI oversight, we’re at the very beginning,” Kohn said. “We need employees to step up and OpenAI to be open.”

The SEC should require OpenAI to produce all employment, severance, and investment agreements that contain nondisclosure clauses to ensure they do not violate federal laws, the letter said. Federal regulators should require OpenAI to notify all past and present employees of the company’s violations and inform them that they have the right to confidentially and anonymously report any violations of the law to the SEC. The SEC should fine OpenAI for “each and every improper agreement” under the SEC Act and order OpenAI to address the “chilling effect” of its past practices, the whistleblowers’ letter said.

Several tech employees, including Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen, have filed complaints with the SEC, which set up a whistleblower program following the 2008 financial crisis.

The fight against Silicon Valley’s use of confidentiality agreements to “monopolize information” has been a long-running battle, said Chris Baker, a San Francisco attorney. He won a $27 million settlement in December for Google employees who accused the tech giant of using onerous confidentiality agreements to block whistleblowers and other protected activities. Now, tech companies are fighting back more and more cleverly to discourage people from speaking out, he said.

“Employers have learned that the cost of leaks is sometimes much higher than the cost of litigation, so they are willing to take the risk,” Baker said.