China's Foreign Ministry criticizes warnings about AI risks, saying “fearmongering, confrontation, and vicious competition ... serve the interests of no one”
China criticized warnings from leading US technology executives to put the brakes on artificial intelligence development …
Context & Ripple Effects
The exchange extends a divide visible at the 2024 U.S.-China AI talks, where U.S. officials raised misuse concerns and China objected to restrictions and pressure. It also comes as China has sought to curb excess competition in its domestic AI sector, distinguishing internal industrial discipline from externally urged limits on development.
The Foreign Ministry's response sits alongside the Ministry of State Security's first public warning on AI security risks. Together, the messages frame AI risk as a matter China will define through national security and domestic policy, rather than through U.S. industry calls for a shared slowdown.
First-order effects
- Leading U.S. technology executives advocating a slower AI pace receive a formal Chinese rebuke, making their safety arguments part of the bilateral rivalry rather than a neutral policy appeal.
- China's public posture separates domestic concern about AI's political, social, cyber, and military risks from opposition to externally driven constraints on AI development.
Second-order effects
- Any U.S.-China safety dialogue must bridge competing premises: U.S. concerns about misuse and Chinese objections to technological pressure and restrictions.
- Chinese AI companies face two policy signals at once: Beijing opposes foreign calls to brake development while maintaining its own campaign against excessive domestic AI competition.
Third-order effects
- If this framing persists, AI governance will be organized less around a common definition of frontier-model risk and more around national-security authority and strategic autonomy.
- Safety proposals from companies and governments will face greater scrutiny over whether they constrain rivals' access to advanced AI, entrenching AI sovereignty as a core fault line.
The trend: AI safety is becoming inseparable from geopolitical competition, with states asserting control over both the risks that count and the remedies they will accept.
Related: Dual-use AI governance · AI sovereignty · State-aligned AI industrial policy · China's Ministry of State Security warns on AI risks · U.S. and China hold high-level AI talks in Geneva
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Discussion
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@metacurity.com
Cynthia Brumfield
on bluesky
China joins the chorus. — China's spy agency warns of AI risk to national security — www.ft.com/content/8715...
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@johnarnold
John Arnold
on x
Every AI policy paper starts out perfectly rational until the What About China section at the very end where the whole proposal falls apart.
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@jcorvinusvr
@jcorvinusvr
on x
I uh... think their strat with open weights is to saturate BRICS with compute and cyberweapon models. Wait for the US to ban open weights cyber models, centralizing predictably, then do a relentless distributed decapitation swarm when the defenses drop.
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@guimarin
Michael Guimarin
on x
Open source AI also threatens China's political legitimacy. Of course they want to regulate it. East and west are aligned on this issue. I see it now OSS AI is an existential threat to our second estate nationstate. In the hands of commoners it threatens to upend the entire syste…
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@dan_jeffries1
Daniel Jeffries
on x
Again China will 1) sign nothing or 2) sign some vague, non-enforceable BS that they will go back on as soon as they can while we tie ourselves in knots. China is on pace to lead in robotics, drones, world models, energy and soon they will have chip independence. The only thing w…
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@spoxchn_maoning
Mao Ning
on x
President Xi Jinping attended Session II of the 18th BRICS Summit and delivered an important statement. President Xi proposed five initiatives for deepening BRICS cooperation: 1️⃣ The open source and inclusive AI initiative. China will be a pioneer in establishing a BRICS AI open…
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@china_amb_india
Xu Feihong
on x
President Xi Jinping attended Session II of the 18th BRICS Summit and delivered an important statement. President Xi proposed five initiatives for deepening BRICS cooperation: 1️⃣ The open source and inclusive AI initiative. China will be a pioneer in establishing a BRICS AI open…
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@sidhant
Sidhant Sibal
on x
China's President Xi Jinping, speaking at the BRICS summit in New Delhi, proposes five initiatives on AI, trade facilitation, digital industry, intelligent manufacturing and science talent:
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@mrbuick
Mr. Buick
on bluesky
Yeah and I want a Ferrari F40 but we can't always get what we want [embedded post]
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@mixedberrytea
@mixedberrytea
on bluesky
Literally wins by default via treating commodities like commodities instead of a speculative asset [embedded post]
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@segyges
SE Gyges
on bluesky
unfortunately the Chinese government has been behaving like a relatively sane actor on the international stage here and the US has not [embedded post]
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r/singularity
r
on reddit
Xi says China will take lead to foster AI, tech cooperation among BRICS countries
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r/technology
r
on reddit
Xi says China will take lead to foster AI, tech cooperation among BRICS countries
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@cryptopunk7213
@cryptopunk7213
on x
china has rejected Dario's proposal for a slowdown citing a “cold war playbook” lol zero surprise china doesn't want to play ball - business as usual - american frontier labs will not slow down. we cannot concede to china and everyone knows it
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@choblin29
@choblin29
on x
🚨HOLY Shit. China's government has now officially responded directly to Dario Amodei. Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun, asked about Dario's proposal today: 'Fearmongering, confrontation and vicious competition will only disrupt the process of global AI governance which se…
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@xenocosmography
@xenocosmography
on x
It keeps getting better. https://x.com/...
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@beffjezos
@beffjezos
on x
China saying the quiet part out loud. We are OFFICIALLY in an AI COLD WAR GAME ON
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@wholemars
@wholemars
on x
Dario literally wrote in his essay that he wants to slow them down as much as possible because he thinks they're assholes. Not the best way to start off a good faith collaboration. Interestingly, Dario used to work at Baidu.
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@martin_casado
@martin_casado
on x
Glad we thought this all out so well.
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@armanddoma
Armand Domalewski
on x
welp.
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@choblin29
@choblin29
on x
🚨EXCLUSIVE: China has now replied to Dario Amodei's call to slow AI. China's state-backed Global Times says Dario Amodei's proposal to slow frontier AI is really a ‘Cold War playbook’ targeting China. It says the plan would curb China's AI development, preserve US dominance and e…
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@dkaushik96
Divyansh Kaushik
on x
The @globaltimesnews WeChat commentary on calls for a coordinated slowdown is quite something. Says the calls for slowing down AI development are reflective of a Cold War containment strategy, and that the “real purpose
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@martin_casado
@martin_casado
on x
“For Chinese teams seeking to catch up and surpass in the technology sector, mastering the know-how and actionable strategies around open source should be a priority skill to focus on.” — Chinese who DGAF about our existential panic
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@kyleichan
Kyle Chan
on x
The last thing Beijing wants is for a Chinese AI model to be used in a cyberattack on Chinese critical systems, as I wrote earlier: https://www.highcapacity.org/ ...
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r/China
r
on reddit
China state newspaper blasts Anthropic's calls to slow AI as ‘Cold War’ tactic
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@max_spero_
Max Spero
on x
Curious what people think about China's actual AI capabilities. It is clear some of these models, even if they are very capable, are partially trained on synthetic data from smarter OpenAI/Anthropic models. If the US paces the frontier, what does this mean for China's capabilitie…
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@michaelaarouet
Michael A. Arouet
on x
The race between US and Chinese AI labs is both fascinating and scary. It took a while for OpenAI and Anthropic to admit what critics warned: frontier models are slipping the leash, agents probe systems they weren't supposed to reach, and cyber capabilities cross
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@noahpinion
Noah Smith
on x
Anthropic can change their minds by using Chinese open-weight models to hack their ass
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@nic_carter
Nic Carter
on x
One thing the p_doomers have no answer to, and have never given a good answer to, is how they intend to bring about a global safety regime. X-risk likelihood must contemplate the **least safe model over a capability threshold**, not the safest frontier model. (If your toddler fin…