The Issue podcast: Top artificial intelligence expert’s blunt message to tech giants

That’s the message to tech giants like Meta from one of Australia’s top minds in artificial intelligence.

He says the government has much more work to do to keep foreign companies from carrying out criminal activity in Australia.

It comes as Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says his government has the behemoths of social media and artificial intelligence in its sights; planning to legislate a digital duty of care this year and beef up regulations next year.

“We don’t think the task is over, there’s more to do,” Energy Minister Chris Bowen says.

“We’re very happy to work with the government to ensure that parents and Australians more generally have control over their use of the internet,” Opposition Leader Angus Taylor says.

But artificial intelligence expert Toby Walsh says there’s a “heap more” to do.

“We can start playing much harder ball with them than we have,” the University of New South Wales professor told 7NEWS podcast The Issue.

The former AI adviser to the government tells The Issue that big tech must be made to pay for the stolen content needed to feed artificial intelligence.

“This is the greatest heist, I suspect, in human history. It’s the theft of all the artwork, all the books, all the songs by the AI companies,” he said.

Walsh underscored the scale of the government’s task by pointing to internal documents from Meta that suggest the social media and AI giant expected 10 per cent of its revenue would come from ads for scams and banned goods; about 15 billion scam ads on the company’s platforms each day.

“I just can’t understand why people haven’t been more outraged by the idea that this is a business where 10 per cent of what they’re doing is criminal,” he said.

Walsh says, ultimately, government must be willing to ban wayward big tech companies from doing business in Australia.

“Get out of our country? Yes, and I can guarantee you that they make a lot of money here, they’d be willing to follow our laws,” he said.

You can catch more of The Issue on Listnr or watch full episodes on our YouTube channel.