Some of the tech biggest names have promised not to support the development, manufacture or trade of lethal autonomous weapons. Elon Musk, DeepMind co-founders Demis Hassabis and Mustafa Suleyman, Google’s Jeff Dean, and AI pioneer Yoshua Bengio of the University of Montreal are just a few of the big names to sign the Lethal Autonomous Weapons Pledge.

It reads: “We, the undersigned, call upon governments and government leaders to create a future with strong international norms, regulations and laws against lethal autonomous weapons. These currently being absent, we opt to hold ourselves to a high standard: we will neither participate in nor support the development, manufacture, trade, or use of lethal autonomous weapons.

“We ask that technology companies and organizations, as well as leaders, policymakers, and other individuals, join us in this pledge.”

Organised by Boston based The Future Life Institute, The Lethal Autonomous Weapons Pledge is intended to galvanise the scientific AI and tech community against the development and use of lethal autonomous weapons (LAWs) and call on governments to take action.

Removing the human component

Already it has received 2,492 signatories from scientists who specialise in artificial intelligence and are concerned by the prospect of “Lethal autonomous weapons, selecting and engaging targets without human intervention,” which they believe will be “dangerously destabilizing for every country and individual.”

More than 172 AI-related firms and organisations have added their name to the list too. The pledge aims to deter military organisations and nations from building and deploying LAWs against human beings.

Furthermore, it calls on governments to set laws and regulations that stigmatise and effectively outlaw the development of LAWs. AI experts believe this would lead to a public backlash against LAWs, similar to the outcry and subsequent ban on the use of landmines.

Global Call to Action

This is not the first call to action against the development of LAWs. This year over 50 top researchers from nearly 30 different countries penned an open letter to Professor Sung-Chul Shin, President of Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology threatening to boycott the university over its collaboration with Korea’s leading arms manufacturer, Hanwha Systems.

Google employees also revolted against the company over its involvement with Project Maven, a US Department of Defense drone project. Their decision was supported by an open letter signed by hundreds of academics.

Last year, Musk and Suleyman lead a group of 116 specialists from over 26 countries in an open letter to the United Nations urging it to block the use of LAWs under the UN’s convention on certain conventional weapons, introduced in 1983.